Yellow
by Skiewrites
Summary: When Lance said he wants to help in the war, he thought he'd be doing missions for the Blade. Instead, he's piloting a Lion of Voltron, with 4 humans that know nothing of the war and 2 Alteans that think they're last Alteans alive. Better yet, all of them believe that he is human instead of the Altean Druid that he had trained to be. Part 3 of the All the Colours of the Wind series
1. Episode 1

**This is third in my series, All the Colours pf the Wind. Please read the previous stories (Grey, then Brown) if you want to fully enjoy this. Also, this will contain elements of season 5 in later chapters. This will be your only spoiler warning!**

* * *

 _Yellow quintessence is a primary quintessence, and it is further classified as a colour quintessence. It represents the quintessence inside the body. The most common use of Yellow quintessence is teleportation and, if you are a species that can change form, changing your physical form. The physical representation of Yellow quintessence is earth and its opposite is the secondary quintessence Purple._

* * *

Something that Lance had learned over the years, during his quintessence training, was patience.

It was something he had struggled a lot with when he was younger, as he never truly understood why he needed to wait for things, didn't understand why they couldn't happen at that precise moment in time. He had always been in a rush to finish things, to be the first to complete a task. Even when he was learning quintessence, he would jump forward in hopes to reap the rewards, only for it to backfire on him royally.

It wasn't until he was fourteen when he fully understood the importance of patience, and even then, he struggled with it.

He sighed from his place on the floor in the dusty shack, and wondered how Hunk, who sat across from him fiddling with some broken piece of machinery that he had found during his rummages, was able to do it. He knew it had to do with his quintessence, but still amazed Lance every time he watched his friend sit there and just wait.

Lance was sometimes too much like the sea, seemingly calm, but never still.

Looking up, Shirogane's sleeping face faced him, screwed up despite being asleep, showing all the year that he was with the Galra, and darkened from the slowly rising sun from the window behind him. Kogane was no where to be seen, though his quintessence showed that he was outside sorting out his bike or his bombs, anxious waves flooding through the walls. Pidge, however, was asleep, leaning her head on Hunk's shoulder while he was now rummaging through her bag, leafing his way through a book as if looking for something after realising that she didn't have what he wanted. Lance's own bag, digging into his back as he was leaning on it, contained far less than Pidge's, though it was more suited for the situation, holding different outfits, facial creams and other things that he'd need for everyday life in space.

Leaning his head on his chest, Lance closed his eyes, hoping to get some shut eye before everything kicked off again, only to be shocked wide awake when Shirogane sat up with a shout, chest heaving with fear. Before Lance could even blink, the older human had already left the cabin, leaving the door wide open

"Should we go after him?" Looking towards the other occupants of the room, Lance noted that Pidge was up, looking oddly young without her glasses on, her brown eyes blinking away the sleep from her being. Hunk had put Pidge's stuff back into her bag, making him look innocent to his crime.

"Nah, Kogane's out there." Lance muttered as he stood, brushing off the dust from sitting on the floor that he doubted Kogane had cleaned recently, given the number of empty wrappers and general things that had not been put away after use. Hunk nodded, standing up too, letting a small number of tools that had been in his lap fall onto the floor, forgetting that they were even there. The noise was enough to shock poor Pidge from her daze, as a scream left her mouth and she quickly stood up, scanning the floor for the source of the banging.

The stare of death that she sent him was well worth laughing at the reaction. However, before she could comment on it, Kogane walked in with Shirogane in tow, following behind almost like a lost puppy, obviously continuing their conversation from before. Walking towards the covered wall, Kogane pulled off a worn sheet, showing off a pin board filled to the brim with photos and string on a back drop of a map of Arizona, all leading to one place.

"I can't explain it, really. After leaving the Garrison, I was lost, but I found myself drawn out to this place. It's almost like, like there's some sort of energy, telling me to look for it…" Lance felt his stomach drop at Kogane's words, and a small giggle like thought appeared in the back of his mind appeared.

The Blue Lion must have planned this for a while, if she drew Kogane here to make sure that the Red Paladin would run off, though, if Catharyne's history was correct, it was the Red Paladin who always discovered Voltron first, even if they never knew what it was at the time.

"…I still don't know what it is, but I stumbled across this area. It's these caves covered with these weird, ancient markings. All of them tell different stories- I haven't come 'round to deciphering them all, but they all share clues about five people coming together to form… something." Kogane told them, and Lance stood forward to have a closer look at the photos. He had done a decent job of capturing them, subconsciously making sure to capture each story in a photo, ranging from the opening of the rift to the birth of Voltron, not that the others knew this, of course. It was surprising that Kogane could even get that far into the glyphs. Shirogane only nodded at the younger's words, then turned towards the rest of the occupants of the room.

"I should be thanking you all for getting me out of there. Lance, right?" Shirogane asked, putting his hand forward for Lance to shake-a weird human custom. Lance hesitated slightly, before latching onto the prosthetic, barely hiding a wince as he came into contact with the corrupt quintessence in the arm that felt poisonous to touch.

Lance went to say something, but as he went to open his mouth to introduce the rest of the team, he paused at the questioning glaze he was receiving at the back of his neck despite not having anyone behind him, making him lift his hand up to rub it.

The Blue Lion was beginning to feel impatient, her quintessence almost bubbling with desire to leave the planet and get rid of the Galra that were steadily getting nearer to the planet she had called her home for so many years. It travelled along their bond like a yawn, leaving behind an itch that Lance knew wouldn't go away until it was scratched.

"Yeah, sorry to interrupt, back to the aliens. Are they coming here? Where are they now? Are they coming for us? Like- at this very moment?" Hunk rambled, putting up a finger for every question he asked. Lance went to answer, tell his best friend not to worry (even though it was pretty likely that the Galra would be after them), then hesitated.

None of them knew he was an alien.

None of them knew who he really was, none of them knew anything about the war, except maybe Shirogane, and even then, he never saw any of the front lines, only what happens to those who disagree with the Empire. They didn't even know they were Paladins yet, or what Voltron even was and who it stood for and protected.

During his time in the Galaxy Garrison, Lance really did forget how ignorant these humans were, living on such an underdeveloped and backwater world.

"I can't really put it together. I remember the word "Voltron". It's a kind of a weapon they're looking for, but I don't know why. Whatever it is, I think that we need to find it before they do." The others agreed unanimously with Shirogane's words, subconsciously deciding to follow his lead, even without knowing he would be their leader as the head of Voltron. Ignorant humans.

"Well, last night, I was looking through Pidge's stuff, cause I wanted to see if sh- uh, if he had a candy bar, but then I started to read his diary-"

"You wHAT?!"

"-And I saw a repeating series of numbers that those aliens are searching look a lot like a Fraunhofer line." Hunk explained, then frowned when he saw three blank stares looking back at him, making him groan. "It's basically a bunch of numbers describing the emission waves that an element gives out. However, this element isn't from Earth, so I recon I could build some sort Voltron Geiger counter that could lead us straight there!" Lance smiled before attacking his best friend with a hug.

The sooner they left this planet with the Blue Lion and lead the Galra from this planet, the better.

* * *

 _Beep._

 _Beep beep._

 _Beep beep beep._

"We must be getting pretty close now!"

They had been walking for about three hours now, in the desert, with no sort of sun protection on or anything. Just the clothes on their backs and the bags that Pidge and Lance brought with them. Before they left the shack, they filled Lance's bag up with as much bars of granola and gum that he had in the house, as well as filling up all the bottles they had available with water, seeing as they didn't know how long they were going to be in the desert for.

It didn't take too much time for them to get to the caves that Kogane had been talking about, either. They were littered with the carvings, and it almost escaped Lance that these stories of old also acted as one of the many layers of protection around the Blue Lion, though she didn't seem to like the idea of having some random Altean Druids casting spells around her, even if it was for her own protection. The carvings were so beautiful, etched so carefully into the stone, making sure that everyone who understood them knew the atrocities that Zarkon has caused on his path for power.

Placing a hand on the cave wall, Lance pushed away the layers of dust to reveal a glyph of the Blue Lion, taking a deep breath as they all started to glow blue, the protection around the Blue Lion and the foundations of the cave breaking underneath his hand, the floor caving underneath their feet, leaving them to fall to their apparent deaths.

That was totally Abuela's idea, and he could almost imagine her laughter as they all tumbled down a waterfall, screaming as they plummeted towards the bottom the cave system.

And when they finally landed in the small pool at the bottom of the waterfall, Lance felt his eyes widen when he realised that he had been here before, with the same Altean inscriptions covering every surface talking about Daibazaal and the rift and every other terrible event that build up the foundation of the last 10,000 years.

Like last time, the Blue Lion stood in the middle of the cave. Unlike last time, nothing about her was alive, making it seem as if she was more of a statue than the sentient beast that Lance had come to know from the legends that he was told about during his own interactions with the Guardian Spirit of Water. The only thing that gave away the fact that it had any energy was the particle barrier that had protected her for almost forever in his eyes.

"Is this it? Is this the Voltron?"

"It must be."

Lance only shook his head at the thought. The Blue Lion being Voltron alone? As if it would be that easy. Kogane was already making his way towards it, his hands leaning on the barrier as if that alone would bring it down.

"I wonder how we get through this." He muttered, almost expecting it to fall away at his words, and seemed slightly disappointed when nothing like that happened. Lance sighed as he went to join the future Paladin, his eyes never leaving the Blue Lion's yellow ones, wondering when they would turn on like before.

"Maybe, you just have to knock." Lance stated, and as he knocked on the barrier, his vision exploded with what almost seemed like a memory, with all five Lions flying together until they formed Voltron, while the barrier itself trickled away like water in a stream.

It was beautiful.

"Uh, did everyone see that?"

"This is what they're looking for."

"Incredible."

"Voltron is a robot. Voltron is a huge, huge, awesome robot!"

"And this thing is only one part of it! I wonder where the rest of them are." Lance smiled at Pidge's excitement, and the wonder that came from the rest of the gang. He couldn't believe that they thought this would be the only part! As soon as the Blue Lion opened her mouth, inviting the Paladins in, Lance raced inside, his eyes darting around, hoping to take everything in at first sight.

Most of the Altean technology was now gone, mainly due to the destruction of Altea. The bits and pieces that survived had long ago been upgraded and warped into things that the Galra now take for granted and don't even think about what it used to be and who used to make it. They say that the Lions of Voltron were the only things from Altea to still be around and not have been upgraded, but even then, it was still a legend to most people, a tale from 10,000 years ago.

Lance slowed down as he reached the cockpit, immediately sitting down in the chair, placing his rucksack on the floor next to him and admiring the interface programmed into the Lion as the others came in, eyes full of wonder as they committed this moment to memory; the first time that they properly interacted with alien technology.

Hunk goes to comment on it, probably say exactly what was going on or gush about the technology, when Lance starts to press some buttons automatically, as if he had done this a thousand times before.

"Lance, what are you- AHH!" Pidge screamed as Lance pushed a lever forward with gusto, feeling a spike of adrenaline rush through him while his passengers screamed from the tops of their lungs, the Blue Lion purring with delight as she finally flew for the first time in ten thousand years.

Now, this is what it meant to fly.

* * *

 **A.N. Guess who updated with a new story that has an amazing beta and is also the reason why I uploaded earlier than 10 years in the future. Like I said before, there will be elements of season 5 even though this will be taking place in the first part of season 1 because of how well it fits in with what I've already planned. I do not have an update schedule, but you can expect it to be more regular than before. My tumblr is on my profile, if you guys want to message me.**


	2. Episode 2

"You are – the worst – pilot – ever!"

Lance smiled brightly at Kogane's words, trying not to let them get to him. He felt a nudge from Blue – press this button, push that lever, look how fast they're going, look how fun this all is, look how free they are. He couldn't help but agree with her, letting the screaming of his passengers become background noise as they flew across the desert, doing the odd flip as Blue felt what it was like to be free to do this for the first time in 10,000 years.

Which was a rather long time to stay still waiting for someone to come along, wasn't it?

"Isn't this awesome?! I'm not even doing anything, it's like she's doing it herself!" Tell a white lie, but saying it was on autopilot sounded more believable to the humans then saying that there was now a small voice in the back of his head that didn't tell him what to do, but gave him impressions instead. Even his family would be hesitant to believe him if he told them.

Oh Altea, his family-

"Make it stop. Make it stop. Make it-"

"Hunk! You better not throw up on me!"

"You and I both know that I have no control over-"

"Don't you dare-"

"Where are you even taking us?" Lance frowned at the question, trying to ignore Hunk and Pidge's squabbling and Shiro's silent stare as he looked down at the controls, feeling the joy from Blue fade away and a pit of nerves at the bottom of his gut begin to boil, making stomach acid rise in his throat, leaving a sour taste in the back of his mouth and an awful thought in his mind.

It was time for them to go.

Because, if they didn't go now, it was likely they'd never make it.

"Like I said, it's on autopilot. She said-" Lance hesitated, the words getting stuck in his throat, the white crystal in his pocket, a gift from Abuela, burning enough to make its presence noticed.

This was his last chance to turn back, to go home, to be with his family, happy and whole again.

But, it was time for them to go.

"She said there's some sort of alien ship approaching Earth. I- I think we're supposed to stop it." Lance said, turning to the rest of his new team, the cockpit gone quiet at the mention of aliens.

"Well, uh, they're after Voltron, right? If this is a part of Voltron, then this is what they're here for, so why don't we, um, I don't know, give it to them? Maybe then they'll leave us alone!" Hunk asked, making Lance grip the controls to the point that his knuckles went white.

There was no way that they could give them the Blue Lion. Not only was it against everything that his family had done in the last 400 years, but he was so close to space now, so close to helping rebels in the war, so close to making sure that Zarkon died properly this time. Even if they were to give up the Blue Lion, there was a high chance that they'll recognise Lance for who he was, and while rebels were slaughtered by the Empire in their arenas, they also loved to watch how long the traitors lasted with the likes of Haggar.

There was no way that he was going to let his family suffer that. Not when he had a chance to make sure that it never happened.

"You don't get it. These monsters spread like a plague throughout entire galaxies in a matter of weeks, destroying everything in their path. There is no bargaining, only victory, or death." Lance shivered at Shirogane's words, hating the way that the motto fell off the man's lips like it was nothing, as if he didn't truly understand how far they were willing to go to win. It was more than their own deaths that the Galra were willing to throw away for triumph, but that of others too, whether it be that of a different species or even their own.

Monsters; there was no better term to describe them.

"Oh. Never mind then."

Following Blue's instructions, Lance flew them up through the atmosphere, enjoying the ways that the controls felt underneath his finger and how much natural this all was. This was much simpler than the bulky ships that humans used to leave their planet; fewer useless buttons randomly across a dashboard, more use of the holograms that his aunt is obsessed with, all written in an older version of Altean than he was used to, but not unbearably so, since the language hasn't changed that much in the last 10,000 years, since there aren't that many people around to give it the diversity it would need to change.

It was much smoother sailing after leaving the atmosphere, Blue having calmed down much more and the nerves of what the future held for them began to rise up in his stomach. Now wasn't the time to admire the fact that they were properly in space, or how the stars twinkled just as brilliantly as Lance had once hoped and how much closer he was to his goal now that they were here. No, instead he had to worry about the fact that some random Galra ship had appeared out of nowhere in front of them and started to shoot at them.

This wasn't how Lance had imagined his first encounter with the species that was responsible for death of millions of his people.

"We've got to get it out of here!" Pidge cried as Lance began to twist the controls automatically, as if he already knew what to do, with Blue giving him a little nudge to show that she didn't appreciate being called an it. Screaming filled the cockpit as Lance and Blue dodged the beams of light, their quintessence flaring harmoniously with each successful dart around and avoidance of the incoming rays, each one getting closer and closer to scraping Blue.

They weren't going to last long at this rate.

Thrusting forwards and pressing a button located on the top of the lever on Blue's console, Lance let out a laugh of surprise when a blast came out of the Lion's mouth, causing a part of the ship to explode in orange flames.

"Holy sh- Lance! This isn't a simulator!" Lance smiled at Pidge's concern.

"That's good. I always crash those!" Mainly because it wasn't build for someone of his species to pilot, but it's not like he was going to say that to them right then and there. Another push forward and he was close enough to the ship for Blue to scratch, causing another line of explosions, much to the joy of the others in the ship. Lance smirked, before turning Blue away and starting a chase, the damaged ship not that far behind them.

It was time for them to go.

 _homecastletakeholeMyPaladinmakehomecastletakeholeMyPaladinmake_

Lance furrowed his brows at Blue's words, thinking about what she was trying to tell him, trying to tune out everyone's yelling about Kerberos and aliens. There was a tingling sensation across his palms where his skin touched the controls, and Blue was nudging along his mind, asking, no, begging for something from him. He closed his eyes, and focus on his breathing, allowing Blue to take what she needed. It felt draining, as if he had done a huge amount of strenuous exercise that left him wanting his bed.

"What is that?" Lance's eyes threw open at Hunk's question, and then widened at what seemed like a magical portal opened in front of them. Blue rumbled in the back of his mind, nudging him along, telling him to go through.

It was time for them to go.

"This may seem crazy, but the Lion wants to enter it. Only, I don't where it will lead us." Lance paused, waiting for a response. He wanted to race though, leave the Galra behind and get to wherever Blue considered safe. But, he wasn't the only person here.

"Shiro, you're the senior officer here. What should we do?" There was no hesitation in Shiro's response, only cementing Lance's idea of Shiro being the Black Paladin.

"Whatever is happening, the lion knows more than we do. I say we trust it, but we're a team now. We should decide together." Lance waited a few minutes for any objections before shrugging and flying them through the weird wormhole.

After all, it was time for them to go.

x-x-x

Everyone was silent as they went through the wormhole, and silent as they exited, though the tension in the Lion was thick and high-strung, as they all waited for another alien ship to jump out at them and attack. The sudden lack of quintessence makes Lance feel light headed and dazed, causing him to take little note of the argument going on around him as he focuses on landing Blue on the nearest planet, where there just so happened to be a castle.

Yawning, Lance landed Blue in front of the castle, as if he had been doing this for his entire life. Slowly, the other humans left the lions, with Shiro taking the lead, Keith and Pidge going behind him and Lance and Hunk ending the group, the Blue Lion gently humming in the back of his mind, though it wasn't any sort of melody, but nevertheless, it encouraged him to close his eyes and just wander after the others as they entered the castle, making him jump every time they shouted as the building performed one of its automated functions.

Humans were behind with technology when compared to the rest of the universe.

"Are these guys… dead?" Lance blinked himself into awareness at Hunk's words, cocking his head slightly at the two cryo-pods that had risen out of the ground, large clouds of gas escaping as the pods raised to their full height. Approaching slowly, Lance went to tap on the controls, but he didn't get close enough to do so before the casing fell away by itself, revealing a beautiful woman dressed in a long and old-fashioned dress that Catharyne would have gushed over. However, Lance's eyes were stuck on her face, with the pink markings under her eyes and pointy ears coming out of her long white hair.

How the quiznak was there an Altean here of all places? Was this place known to Zarkon? If Zarkon knew that this castle exists, then they were at risk and should be leaving as soon as-

"Father!" Leaping forward, Lance caught the girl, unsurprised when she was heavier than she originally looked. She looked up, a confused look on her face which only reminded Lance that he was in his human form, that nobody here knew about his heritage.

"Who are you? Where am I?" She asked, looking around at the other humans.

"I'm Lance, and you right here in my arms." Lance flirtatiously smiled, ignoring the way that the girl frowned at his words, and instead stared right at his face.

"Are those your ears? They're hideous. What's wrong with them?" Lance flushed, pulling his arms to his ears, feeling the unnatural curve of the top of them. Most of the time he can ignore the fact that they had to be like this, but now that she's pointed them out, he was feeling very self-conscious.

"Hey! I'll have you know that there's nothing wrong with them! They heard exactly what you s- AH" Lance screamed as the girl reach for his ear and twisted, hard. Grabbing his arm and pushing, he was quickly on his knees, not able to move anywhere.

"Who are you? Where is King Alfor? What are you doing in my castle?" Lance felt his insides freeze at the questions, his heart racing and breaking coming out in panicked breaths. Why would she be asking about King Alfor? He's been dead for over 10,000 years now. Surely, she should know that?

"Uh, a giant blue lion kidnapped up and brought us here. That's all we know!" Ah Hunk, ever the mediator.

"How do you have the Blue Lion? Where is her Paladin? What are you all doing here? Unless… how long has it been?" The last question was muttered under breath as she rushed over to the console and brought it up, uploading the information from the cryo-pods, all written in the same old Altean script as in the Lion.

"We don't know what you're talking about. Why don't you tell us who you are? Maybe we could help you." Shiro asked in a soothing voice, hoping to quell the Altean and make it less likely that she'll attack any of the others.

"I'm Princess Allura of the Planet Altea-" She continued to talk to the others, but Lance didn't pick any of it up, even when the other guy came out of his own pod and stated going on about how he could take down Hunk.

No. Quiznaking. Way.

This was impossible. There was no way that this person in front of him was the fabled last Princess of Altea, lost to history and often thought to be made up. This had to be some sort of imposter, someone who knew that they were coming, a trap to catch Voltron made by the Galra.

Just as he was about to raise this point, reveal himself to the rest of the group, to point out the flaws in this stupid plan to capture Voltron, she paused from typing, her hands shaking as if she had suddenly been doused in an icy bucket of water.

"It can't be…"

"What is it?"

"We've been asleep for 10,000 decaphoebs."

Lance couldn't help but look away at the wail of anguish that she let out, before the older Altean, her guard perhaps, caught her in a hug.

There was no way that you could fake that.


	3. Episode 3

The longer that Lance stood there, watching the other Alteans reboot the castle and answer the questions the others kept firing at them, the more he felt like an outsider, like a spy, gathering information about their enemy before planning the next course of action.

He hated the fact that he looked these people in the face - people who looked so similar to his family yet so different, who had just learned something that is considered history to him - and let them believe the assumptions they've made about what happened in the 10,000 years they had missed.

Lance doubted that telling them that some of their species had survived, but now mostly serve the Galra and are generally more feared then the species they work under, would cheer them up that much.

In fact, he doubted that it would go down that well at all.

Lance's ears twitched unnoticeably at the sound of squeaking, and frowned when the girl, Allura, went over to the pod that she had been in and picked up four mouse-like creatures from the bottom of it. They reminded him of the horror stories that his sibling would tell him, about the time that Mama experimented with some Earth mice so much that she could hear their thoughts.

It seems that sharing a cryo-pod with Altean mice has the same affects.

Suddenly, an alarm started to blare from one of the monitors, with a script flashing on the screen. Both of the Alteans rushed over the screen, trying to figure out what was wrong and how to solve the problem.

"A Galra battleship has set its trackers onto us." Lance could feel the strong spikes of fear bounce off Allura and Shiro's quintessence and concern roll from the rest of the humans, who probably hadn't properly realized what Lance had dragged them into.

(They were going to hate him when they found out.)

"How did they find us?" Allura asked, the mourning for her lost species suddenly wiped off her face and replaced with a cold mask that spoke of revenge. Her words did bring up a valid point, as while they had been attacked by a Galra ship, there was no way they could have tracked them through wormhole, unless they were able to detect where wormholes open and closed…

Ugh, physics. That was much more Hunk's area of specialties than his. Lance could almost guarantee that his best friend could work out the complexities of wormholes in a matter of vargas.

(Can he still be Hunk's best friend after dragging him away from Earth, from his mom, and into a war that had nothing to do with him?)

"I'm not sure, but, I bet that it's Keith's fault!" Lance stated, sparing a glance at the other boy, hoping to make sure that he was at least included with the conversation to some degree (even if this wasn't really the best way to do so), as he had been silent during the whole interrogation. Keith only frowned at Lance before stepping forward towards him.

"Yeah, well, say whatever you got to say to make yourself feel better about yourself. After getting us all stuck on the other side of a wormhole!" He growled out. Lance grimaced at the words, eyebrows furrowing.

They were _not_ stuck here, they could leave quite easily with the Blue Lion, and it most certainly was not his fault!

Well…

Maybe?

Kinda?

Only a little?

Okay, it totally was his fault that they were stuck on the other side of a wormhole. But, like, Lance was going to let Keith have the one up on him!

No.

Nope.

Non.

Nada.

"I'll stick you on the other side of a wormhole!" Lance yelled back, stepping closer to the other boy, closing the distance. Keith's eyes narrowed and- was that a sly smile on the other boy's face?

Oh great. Now they're bonding. That's what he really needed right now, to bond with the weirdest human he could have picked up from Earth.

"Stow it you two! We don't have time to argue like this, instead, we have to work as a team." Shiro stated, making sure to separate the pair of them, giving Keith a special glance that meant something to the pair of them but nothing to Lance, showing the close bond between the two of them. "How long until they arrive?"

"At their speed? Oh, well… that's, uh… carry the three… um… take off one… I'd say about a couple of days!" Coran said brightly, holding up two fingers on one hand and another on his other, looking very proud of himself, while Hunk and Pidge look at him with doubt filling their eyes as well the prayers of suicide.

Ah, the joys of being friends with STEM kids.

"Good. Let them come! By the time that they get here, you all will have reformed Voltron, and together, we will destroy Zarkon's Empire and bring peace to the known universe!" The female Altean stated proudly, echoing around the silent room, coldness tinting her voice, and the mourning she was doing not even a tick ago missing, not even a strand of evidence to say that it was even there in the first place.

However, her words struck something in Lance, which caused him to frown and cock his head. She sounded so sure of their ability to form Voltron, so sure of their goals and even how to go about them. There was no way that they were going to be able to bring peace to the whole known universe, not with just the seven of them.

They were going to need help, and a lot of it.

The question was, how long were they going to wait around until they allowed people to back them up?

"Princess, there are five of these… lions? How are we supposed to find them?" Shiro was the first to break the silence, and the girl only smiled and walked over to a podium with two raised pads that couldn't be much bigger than someone's hand.

"Ah, you see, King Alfor connected the Lions to the Princess's life force. She alone is the key to the Lion's whereabouts." The advisor described to the group as the other put her hands on the raised pads, smileing as everyone gasped in wonder of the star map coming out of where her hands connected to the computer.

"Amazing! These are coordinates. The Black Lion seems to be in the same location as the Blue Lion!" Pidge pointed out as the planet they were on sped past her face. The ginger haired Altean was very surprised at this for some reason, commenting on how her synapse was firing away, making Lance want to laugh really loudly.

This man is so underprepared for what these humans were going to throw in his face.

Lance could not wait.

"As you may have noticed, the Lions choose their Paladin. It is a mystical bond that cannot be forced, as the quintessence of the chosen pilot must mirror that of the Lion. Separate, they can be a force reckoned with, but together, they form something that not even science can-" It's at this point that Lance began to drone out Allura's voice, as pretty as it was. He already knows about Voltron, quiznak, he had grown up in a family that had been protecting one of the Lions for generations.

Instead, he focused on the different systems around him, each labelled in Altean, each with their own colour. It was scary to see how many had requested for help, how many of them had been turned off because it was already too late to help them.

For some of them, it was 10,000 decapheobs too late.

"-the Blue Lion is the most adaptable of the Lions, able to change to its environment the quickest. She requires a pilot that has a strong mind to keep up with her. That is why Lance, you will pilot the Blue Lion." Lance blinked at the mention of his name and the almost silent purr in the back of his mind, Blue happy with her choice of Paladin after waiting so many decapheobs for hers to come along. He only sighs in agreement with her, half listening to what Allura had to say about the other Lions as he let Blue's quintessence roll and comfort his own, letting her into his mind like the times he has let her before.

"Unfortunately, I cannot seem to locate the Red Lion at the moment. However, that isn't too surprising, the castle is 10,000 decapheobs after all, it might need some work." She managed to strain a smile at the five of them, as if there was actual humour in the whole situation.

"We don't have much time. Pidge and I will go after the Green Lion. Lance, you'll take Hunk and pick up the Yellow Lion. Keith, you'll going to be staying here, just in case they find the Red Lion." Shiro gave out orders like it was nothing, and everyone completed them like they had been following him their whole life.

The Black Lion couldn't have picked someone more suited for the role.

x-x-x

"Something I don't get is how the Lions will turn into legs. How would that work? Also, how long do you think it take to find it? 'Cause I need to pee – do aliens pee? – and I'm starting to get nervous, and what if it doesn't like me and doesn't make me it's Paladin or what if we get lost and we can never get back to the others and what if the aliens-"

"Please. I doubt it would take that long, it didn't take that long to find Blue after all. And like Allura said, you have the biggest heart out of us all, nobody can turn away from that!" Lance smiled up at his friend, who was gripping the top of his seat with an iron fist, as if letting go had dangerous consequences, which disgruntled Blue slightly, though Lance couldn't place on why it did so.

More bonding was needed before they unlocked that level it seemed.

The planet that Yellow was supposed to be on was nice, Lance supposed. It was rocky, and yellow, fitting as the location for the Lion, and it was so similar to Earth's own rock-strewn terrain that Lance could imagine closing his eyes and being back on the planet he was raised on.

Except for the fact that the Galra were already here, if the ships following them had anything to say about it.

"Oh, no, no, no, no!I thought Coran said that these planets were peaceful!" Hunk screamed as Lance went on the defensive, dodging all the bullets that the Galra unleashed onto them by spinning on the side and diving down into the ravine, hoping that the agility that the Lion gave him would help him out-fly the ships.

"Yeah, well, I think his knowledge of the universe it just a tad bit out of date!"

The hologram showing the tail of Blue told him that his hopes had been shot cleanly.

Quiznak.

"Right. That makes sense. Uh, according to the coordinates, we're right on top of the Yellow Lion, which means that it should be about… there!" Hunk stated, pointing a part of the screen where there was evidence of more glyphs, his hand stilling clutching the back of the chair like a lifeline.

Well, with the plan that Lance had brewing in his mind, with the help of Blue of course, his best friend wouldn't be holding that for too much longer.

"Okay then. I'll drop you down there and provide you with some cover." The look of utter dread that settled on Hunk's face only made Lance feel guiltier about everything he had done to him in the last couple of vargas, but it was necessary if they wanted to live.

Lance didn't wait for Hunk to disagree with him before he flew as close to the cave systems they identified and followed Blue's nudging, pressing the right sequence of buttons that caused the floor behind the pilot's seat to pull away, leaving Hunk to fall for about meter onto the dusty ground below.

Immediately, he pulled away from the ground and away from his friend, causing his tail-ers to follow him up into the atmosphere, the shower of lasers as relentless as ever. Gripping the controls hard enough to turn his knuckles white, Lance focused on trying to dodge away from each missile, each of them coming closer and closer to hitting him. Blue kept nudging in his conscious in a distracting way, like a persistent five year old trying to show you something you've already seen a million times while you're trying to finish off some coursework for a class that you were failing.

Instantly, a feeling of annoyance filled his mind, his vision filled with pure blue for half a tick, his body freezing with shock as all his senses fell away from reality and retracted into his mind for no more than a tick.

But, it was a tick too long, as when Lance came back into reality, he was falling.

Falling; a fear for all pilots. If you were falling, then you weren't flying with control. If you were falling, you were failing at your job. If you were falling, then, as the pilot, you are responsible for any deaths and injuries that occur to your crew.

If you were falling, then it's more than likely that you wouldn't live to see the ground.

The G-force was the only thing keeping him to his chair as he plummeted down to the planet's surface, his hands glued to his sides as the controls in front of him crackled with electricity. Blue was missing from the back of his mind, leaving a large empty gap that he didn't know used to be there before he became her Paladin, which shouldn't be there in the first place.

Lance yells and swears when he crashed into one of the cliff sides, gaining several bruises that were going to be impossible to hide using any sort of product and would sting for the next few quintants (if he lived that long), but something he's grateful for, as, if he was in anything other than a Lion of Voltron, then it would be a different story. Blinking, he watched as the hologram in front of him still held a view of what was going on outside Blue, still showing the Galra ships flying closer and closer towards him, still showing one of them releasing multiple shots, heading straight towards him-

This isn't how Lance pictured his death.

He had, of course, thought about it, since he had been thinking of joining the war years , back then, he had the idea that he would have done at least something before it got to this point.

Lance squeezed his eyes closed, clutching at Blue's controls as he felt her come back to him much too slowly, preparing for inevitable impact of the miss-

"I've got ya buddy!" Lance's eyes snapped open as his best friend's voice filled the cockpit, and he let out a large, shaky sigh that he didn't know he was holding back, the adrenaline fading out of his blood, leaving his limbs shaky and his head light.

"You just jumped in front of those shots for me!" He said as Blue began to put more pressure on the back of his mind, something he ignored for the moment, despite her anger and concern towards the situation and his wellbeing.

Now wasn't the time.

"Er, well, I was trying to get out of the way to be honest. However, what it lacks in speed, it more than makes up for in armour." Lance wince slightly at the lack of personal pronouns, but smiled nonetheless as Hunk went on a rant about the brilliance that was alien technology while they flew back towards the wormhole they would take them away from the planet.

While Hunk may hate him later on for what he had done, Lance could really see the human enjoying some things that space could offer him that earth could never facilitate.

x-x-x

 **A.N. Hey guys! So, this chapter was supposed to be uploaded yesterday, but this website crashed for unknown reasons so... :/.**

 **So, updates on everything that's going on, this story won't be updated uptil about Easter time (hopefully) because, not only have I started working as well as college, but my doctor's put me on some new pills that have a side effect of making me drowsy, so I'm not sure how that will affect my writing. Also, you guys can expect updates for 'A Well-Known Nobody' and 5 Ghouls and 1 Human as I'm working on finishing the newest chapters for those. Furthermore, I am participating in a Hide Big Bang, so lots of time has been going into that.**

 **Last note: My beta Alex is not only a star, but the biggest and brightest of them in the entirety of space. They have been helping me so much lately, and words cannot describe how grateful I am for it!**

 **Question for you guys: How did you find this fic and/or series? Leave your answers in the comments!**


	4. Episode 4

"You made it!"

Lance frowned as he walked into the castle's control room, Hunk trailing a step behind him. Of course, Pidge, Keith and Shiro were already gathered around the Alteans, looking up at the holographic screens above them.

"Yeah, barely! That was a nightmare! I almost puked out there; I felt like Hunk!" Lance complained, though there was no heat to his words, followed by Hunk commenting about actually being Hunk. Pidge gave a little chuckle at their words, giving Shiro a side glance before smiling at the pair of them.

"Yeah. We had a hard time, too." She smiled, looking away form him to look at Shiro's small smirk and Keith's confusion, her quintessence bubbling in a mischievous way.

That little-

"Found him." The female Altean muttered, her aura feeling much more muted compared to the others in the room. Taking a step forward to come into line with the others, Lance glanced at the screen, taking a note of the Altean script that flashed on the top of a screen, an image of a Galran battleship flying ominously through space.

So this is where they had been keeping the Red Lion.

"Wait, this ship is orbiting Arus!" Pidge exclaimed, looking at the coordinates, causing Hunk to whimper.

"They're here already?" Shiro asked grimly, looking at the advisor, who looked slightly guilty at accidently providing the wrong information.

"Yes, well, I guess my calculations were a bit off. You see, finger counting is more of an art skill than a precise science. You see, I learned this skill from my great-uncle who- Oh?" the orange man stopped half way through his sentence when the screen flicked, going from the still image of what lay ahead to a live video of a grim looking Galra, who's eye had been replaced with one no doubt from the druids, if the yellow glare was anything to go by.

"Princess Allura. I am Commander Sendak of the Galra Empire. I speak on the behalf of Emperor Zarkon, Lord of the Known. I am here to collect the Lions of Voltron that you possess. Fail to comply and I will destroy your planet." There was no tick of hesitation before the image disappeared from the screen, leaving the room with a screaming silence that lasted just under a dobosh.

Then the reality of the situation set in, and chaos started.

"Oh, we're all going to die!"

"Alright, let's not panic-" Shiro started, before he was interrupted by a panicked Hunk.

"Not panic! Th-the scary purple alien cat thing is driving a battleship towards us! We only have four lio-"

"Three lions, get it right!" Pidge muttered under breath, making it a wonder how she was heard through Hunk's ramblings.

"yeah, three working lions, thanks Pidge. Three working lions and a 10,000-year-old castle. Real fighting odds." Hunk pointed out, and Lance agreed. Not that he didn't trust old Altean technology, but he didn't trust old Altean technology that hadn't been used in 10'000 decapheobs. The fact that they only had four Lions was also a problem, but it was more of a problem in the fact that having three that were working and one that wasn't on one easily targeted planet, rather than the fact that they had them at all. They each had Paladins, which was more than they had on Earth for decapheobs and they managed just fine.

Though, the circumstances were much, much different.

There's no one here trained enough to protect one dormant Lion, let alone one dormant and three very much awake Lions.

They couldn't stay here.

Lance put his hands in his pockets, feeling the small white crystal in his pocket and tried to let the quintessence wash over him, let it calm him down and make the panic go away.

Unsurprisingly, it didn't work that well.

"No. We've just got to figure out a plan of attack, and figure it out quickly." Shiro said strongly, looking from each of them.

"Well, I suggest we just jump through a wormhole and live to fight another day, preferably when we have all the Lions." Lance stated, using hand gestures demonstrating them going through said wormhole, leaving the white crystal to try and do its work through his jacket, not that it was working that well to begin with. Hunk nodded and agreed with what he said, starting to go on about snakes and worms and how to properly travel through the wormhole with the three Lions that they currently had.

If it meant that they got to their destination, preferably without any Galra there, then who was Lance to argue against the Lions forming worms and snakes instead of forming Voltron?

"We can't just abandon Arus! The Galra will keep destroying planets and taking prisoners until we stop them!" Pidge yelled, causing Hunk to step back from her and raise his hands in surrender.

"Okay, so we run and let him follow us, like we did back on Earth, and then we form the weird wormhole thing and get out of here."

"But he could destroy the planet and then come after us. Staying is our only option." Keith stated, arms crossed and facing away from the others, watching the screen in front of him, as if expecting it to turn back on the Galra Commander.

"Oh, finally joining in are you Keith?" Lance muttered, earning himself a turn in the head from Keith to look directly at him without blinking (which was so weird, did he need to ever blink?) and a death glare from Shiro. Lance only sighed before continuing.

"Well, it's not like we can stay here with a Galran Commander on our jzopakh!" Keith frowned at his use of Altean (which he shouldn't really know but quiznak it all at this point), before crossing his arms and looking away from him.

"We're staying."

"Leaving"

"Staying!"

"Snake!"

"Guys, stop." A single command from Shiro silenced the room. After a tick or so, Shiro nodded, and turned towards the Altean standing on the podium. "Princess Allura, these are your lions. You've dealt with threats like this before. You know more about what we're facing better than any of us combined. What do you think is the best course of action." Lance's eyes widened, before frowning.

Why was he asking for their advice? From the sound of it, they have had no experience with the war, and there was no evidence that they weren't going to send them to their doom or something. For all they knew, they were actually druids who just so happen to have a degree in acting.

Unlikely, but still an option at this point.

"I-I don't know." She whispered, and it seems that shock of the situation had finally settled in, even after her outburst earlier that day.

okay, so maybe they weren't spies, but that isn't to say that they should be trusted straight away. The other Altean stepped forward and talked about visiting her father, who was now an AI, leaving him and the rest of the humans behind in the control room in an awkward silence to go and speak to this weird AI, if it was an AI at all.

Oh god these people were just as trusting as Shiro.

If they survived after today, a very big if at this rate, he was to have to sit these people down and talk about not trusting alien species that they met five doboshes ago.

"So we're actually trusting these people?" Lance asked, breaking the silence of the room, his hands going back into his pockets, fiddling with the crystal again, using it as a focus point and to keep his anger in.

"And what, exactly, is that supposed to mean?" Keith asked, staring at him with such intensity that, quite honestly, freaked him out. Did he not know how to blink?

"Well, we fly of into space, right? We've already has to run away from one hostile group, but it turns out that not only do they want to kill us, but take away these cool mystical Lions that we found, as if they haven't heard the phrase 'finders keepers' once in their lives. With that in mind, how likely is it that the next group of aliens we find is a nice alien species that wants to help us?" Lance pointed out, smiling slightly when he saw Hunk nod along with what he's said and Pidge fiddle with her glasses, while Keith just blinked and looked away towards Shiro, curious as to what he had to say for himself.

"Well, they haven't done anything to make us not trust them Lance, and they seemed to have more experience with-"

"More experience? Shiro, just because they know who we're are apparently fighting does not mean they have any experience with fighting at all! In fact, with that reaction, I doubt she's ever seen a battle, let alone fought in a war, as well as the fact that she apparently slept for 10'000 years, conveniently missing the _entire_ war in the first place! Are you saying that that is even possible, even with all of this advance technology?" Lance exclaimed.

"Lance!" Shiro said loudly, but not to the point that he was shouting. "I know you're concerned, but trust me when I say that I've met many aliens in the past year who want to kill me. These Alteans are not one of them." Lance went silent at his words, looking away from the new Black Paladin, the tension in the room only growing at the reminder of what their new leader had been put through.

But, while Shiro did have a point, he didn't understand how bad it would be if they were in the hands of bad Alteans, rather than the rare good ones.

"Ah, Paladins, if you would like to follow me please! We have something to show you!" The elder Altean popped his head into the room, encouraging the others to follow him through the castle and to a lower level, where Allura was patiently waiting for them, dressed in something more appropriate for the situation.

"You five Paladins were brought here for a reason. The Lions of Voltron are meant to only be piloted by you and you alone. Thus, we must fight and keep fighting until we defeat Zarkon, and free the Known from his reign. We are the universe's only hopes." She stood tall and proud, in her battle gear that made her look more like a commander than the princess that she apparently was. Lance went to open his mouth to comment how she could always command him, but he stopped himself.

He was already on Shiro's bad side for saying the truth. Better not give him more reason to hate him.

She led them towards their armour, which they quickly got into, both Hunk and Pidge marvelled at when it fitted much better towards their size, which made Lance smile and wonder how they'd react to actual Altean technology rather than their clothing.

"The bayard is the traditional weapon of the paladins of Voltron. It takes a distinct shape for each Paladin, and can change depending on not only the situation you may find yourselves in but your very will, with enough training. Shiro, I'm afraid that your bayard was… Was lost with its last paladin." Lance frowned at her words.

But Zarkon was the last Black Paladin, and he would hardly call the Emperor of a universe wide Empire lost.

Why would she lie to them?

Frowning, he took the bayard out of the air, and gave out a small yelp of surprise at a small zap of quintessence from the circlar object, which then turned the round object into what looked like a sick ass gun, and his mind it quickly taken back to not two doboshes ago, when Allura mentioned it changed according to its Paladin, causing Lance to look around the room to see the rest of his new team admiring their weapon, with Keith having a sword, Hunk with a huge shoulder canon and Pidge-

"Aw, you have a cute little bayard." Lance cooed, and thought it was well worth the electric shock he received from her, leaving him gasping from a breath on the floor from his silent laughter and the aftershocks.

Time to go and collect a Lion.

x-x-x

"Uhh, Lance, how are we supposed to do this?" Hunk asked and Lance would have shrugged in reply if they could see each other, but it seems that they hadn't had the time to discover that function.

"I don't know, I've never done something like this before." Lance muttered, rolling his eyes at Blue's faint grumbling, hating the whole situation, making Lance frown, then sadly smile and pet one of the many panels inside of Blue's cockpit.

They were going to be okay.

They could do this.

"Attention, Galra Battleship. Do not fire, we're surrendering the Lions." Lance said clearly, his nerves tingling along his forearms and to the very tips of his fingers that clutched Blue like a life line.

God his family were gonna kill him when they find ou-

If.

If they find out.

If they ever see him ag-

"What is that thing!?" lance was torn from his thoughts at the sight of the tracker canon charging up a beam in front of them, getting ready to clutch its hands around their Lions and take them for their own.

Not in this lifetime.

"That's the signal to get out of here!" Lance screamed as he pushed for Blue to speed away, breathing in relief as he watched Hunk do the same, and they both started to dodge fighter ships as the Commander realised that he had been tricked, and so easily too. Smiling, Lance began to dance around them, laughing slightly at each explosion caused, at each laser hit its mark, sighing at Blue's muffled purring as she agreed with the actions that he took.

"Whoa-ho-ho! Go girl!" Lance screamed as he and his Lion began to take down fight after fighter after fighter, cheering loudly when Hunk managed to destroy their ion canon, and tension was able to leave his body when Hunk called out that Keith had been able to leave the ship with the Red Lion, smiling along with the other cheers of the paladins along the comm line.

Four down, one to go, and probably the easiest one to get out of all of them, none of them even having to get out of their own Lions except for Shiro, leaving the Green Lion along with other aliens that they seemed to have picked up, directing them over to Coran, alone, with Allura presumably still in the control room, who smiled and waved at them before taking them out of the hangers. Once they left, Lance could only lean back and grin like a mad man as all the Lion's roared with a ferocity that he had only heard of, deep and rumbling from their very quintessence, joining together with their siblings to wake up the eldest and their leader.

(They all had to wait for Shiro to wake up to find Voltron after all.)

x-x-x

It felt like hours later that he was walking into what Lance was now calling the lounge, that had a kitchen only down the hall and was obviously used for long term residents, after having finally formed Voltron despite how hard it seemed to be. Lance immediately jumped onto the floor couch, smiling when his bruises and the bruises on the bruises ached through the action, and grinned when he saw Keith do the same while the others sat down in a calmer fashion, landing not far from him, who gave a small smile in return, his quintessence seemingly pouring from his pores, similar to what the other Paladin's quintessence was doing, as if trying to reach out to the others and connect in the same way that forming Voltron gave them.

It was beautiful.

"You Paladins did wonderfully out there! It's a good thing that you know what your doing, as you're going to be doing that again and again!" Coran said as he walked in after Allura, who smiled thinly and walked over to the controls, inputting data that Lance could care less about.

"Wait what?!" Hunk shouted, making Pidge, who was leaning on his shoulder and nodding off, jump in surprise and blink in shock through her glasses. "We barely did it in the first place. How on Earth are we supposed to do it again?" Coran only smiled in return, before offering to show them to their rooms, spending the walk there going on about how the universe has changed since the last Paladins were here, talking about all the good changes that he's managed to find.

Nothing was raised over the bad.

When Lance got into his room, he couldn't help but rummage through the room, raiding through the clothes hung up in the closet, and wonder if trusting these Alteans would become the best thing or the worst thing that Voltron had ever done.


	5. Episode 5

Lance's journey to consciousness was slow, but satisfying, even if he did get the impression that he was missing something.

Yawning widely, he took his time to open his eyes, instead rolling over to the colder side of his pillow and ravelling in the soft yet firm and supporting material that rested underneath his head, and he lazily wondered when the Galaxy Garrison decided to fork out money for the comforts of the students all of a sudden, because he would have remembered if he had slept on something so amazingly comfortable for the past ten months.

Opening his eyes, Lance stretched and took in the white walls and ceiling, making a small note in the back of his head about the lack of windows and the missing desk and Hunk's overall disappearance, from his bed and belongings to his actual being.

Though, now sitting up on the bed, Lance frowned and looked around the room a bit closer. It was bigger than he was used to, but only slightly, and that may because, instead of having to house two cadets, it only housed an Altean now. Where there once used to be two chests of drawers, two desks and another bed was only space to put them in.

It wasn't until he stood up of the bed, standing on top of two, rather cute looking, blue lion slippers, that it all dawned on him, leaving him with two thoughts and made his stomach drop down and down and down into the abyss of space.

One: his family were going to murder him. No, they're going to do more than murder him. They're going to burn him alive, after finding him this far away from them of course. First drag him back to earth, then burn him alive and scatter his ashes into a grave like they did with Papa just to make sure that he'd never leave again.

Two: He'd better find the others. He didn't really trust them due to how trusting they were with other alien species they've just met. Who knows what kind of trouble they'd get into.

So, with only a few wrong turns and a couple of missed doorways (he was very proud of himself for that because he was usually worse), he finally managed to get to the control room that they spent so much time in yesterquintant.

It turns out, however, that his sense of direction wasn't the only thing that was wrong.

"Where have you been!? We've ran a test on the alarms, and testing to see how you all would react. Guess who failed." Lance blinked at Allura as his mind took its sweet, sweet time trying to process her words through a language that he took so long to learn. Luckily for him, he had Hunk to jump to his recuse, going on about how long the other Alteans have had to rest before all of this and trying to put things into perspective for them.

He hated having to translate this early in the morning, when there are better things to be doing, like eating breakfast for example. Allura's face said differently about morning schedules, however.

So, needless to say, Hunk's efforts were all for nothing, because all they got out of it was a reality check from the Princess and the fact that they were all going to be starting training that day in hopes for it to go well.

Lance somehow got the feeling that it wouldn't work out the way that she'd want it to go.

* * *

Lance really didn't know what she was expecting from them, but, clearly, this was not it.

"Ah fuck, they almost hit me-"

"Language Pidg-"

"Shiro, we're being bombarded by the Castles with _lasers_ , I don't think a bit of ' _adult language_ ' is the biggest problem he-"

"Lance was right, we never should have trusted them!"

"Wait wait wait, Keith? Did you just say that you agreed with me? Are you feeling okay dude?" Lance asked into the coms, smiling brightly as the other boy groaned and muttered something along the lines of taking back his words, despite the attack on the five of them that was currently going on. Blue seemed to be agreeing with his humour anyway, happy to dance along with the giant lasers that were being shot at them, some images of fishes from Earth filtering through the bond, not that Lance had any clue what his Lion was trying to tell him, but the feeling was there all the same.

"Uh, guys? Isn't Voltron about working as a team? All of this arguing isn't going to make us work as a tea- Oh my god that was way too close! Stop! Please! Have mercy on us!" Hunk's voice echoed through the coms, with Allura's voice coming along, as piercing and commanding as ever.

"You think that Zarkon will be merciful when he finds us. No, in fact, he's probably on his way to destroy us all right now!" There was some muttering still coming from the castle after this line that was probably supposed to be motivational but really wasn't, but Lance tuned it out as the firepower from the castle grew tenfold, and he could have sworn that it was particularly aimed towards him more than the rest of the group.

"How on Earth are we supposed to form Voltron with this? We barely have enough time to dodge, let alone become a giant ass robot!" Pidge yelled, and Lance was suddenly glad that the technology seemed to have lowered her initial volume, because if they were yelling now, when there was really nothing to be worried about (maybe, unless the Alteans inside were really spies and good actors and were spending the time while they were distracted indoors and contacting the Empire and oh god they were all going to die if that was true) then he didn't want to hear here when they were in the middle of a fight surrounded by the Empire.

Though, Lance did smile as Shiro reprimed Pidge again on her use of words.

Maybe she should teach her some words in Altean or Galran, only even to see Allura's or Coran's face when she says them in the wrong context. Hmm. Maybe Spanish or French would be better, but he was pretty sure that Shiro would know what they mean, since not only was he at least bilingual but was a teacher at the most multilingual educational system in the USA, so he's probably heard it all already.

Shame, really.

Just over half a varga later, the barrier and the lasers suddenly stopped, leaving them hanging around the castle in slight confusion, but more relieved that the bombardment was over.

They were very quick to agree, for the first time since they left their home planet, with the fcat that they all needed a break, meaning that they all quickly conegrated to the small dining room that Coran had shown them the night before, ready to drink a pouch of water and a bite to eat, seeing as breakfast had been skipped due to priorities.

Allura's priorities that was, as it was quickly shown when she walked into the room and quickly frog martched the five of them to the training deck where a bunch of drone laid ready to kick their jzopakh as soon as they got into the room, leaving them to fall straight into the floor and listen to how bad they were at acting like a team that they were apparently born to be, which she further tries to prove to them by sending them through an invisible maze with another to lead them through it.

Needless to say, Lance was very happy when it was time to go back to the Lions.

He wonders if he should take his words back, or, even better for everyone, not speak at all to stop him from jinxing it.

Or maybe they should just stop Coran from teaching them to be Paladins. From what he remembered, Coran was not even mentioned in the lofty tomes that Catharyne loved, except for maybe a random footnote related to King Alfor, the first paladin of Voltron. His grandfather, on the other hand, was marvelled apon in those books, and praised beyond belief, to the point that some authors even put the creation of the Lions onto the bloke.

(Not that he knew anything about that except for Catharyne's rablings, but he could imagine that this information would be something that Coran would treasure for the rest of his life.)

(He should probably tell Coran everything, all things considered.)

(Unless he was a spy, but at this point, did it even matter if they were going to be killed by the Empire?)

Well, the point was, this really wasn't Coran's place of business nor his area of expetice, so why he was spending so much of his day speaking into a mic at the Paladins only to watch them fail was beyond Lance.

(Further thought suggested that either the Princess was too proud or too embarrassed by them to continue with the training, which Lance can actually blame her for, as humans were weird, and he was not any better than them due to his upbringing.)

"You'll never be able to form Voltron unless each of you have a close bond with your Lions. Everyone, put your Lions into a nosedive." Coran said cheerfully through the coms, and the tone made Lance grip harder to Blue's controls as he did not like the joyful way that Coran sounded, but couldn't help but smile at the growl that Blue let out in agreement.

See, why did he need to improve his bond with his Lion when they were already this close? He and Blue were best buds for life, even if they had only really known each other for about a month.

"This is an expert-level drill that you shouldn't really be doing attempting until you have been flying for years, but uh, we're in a bit of a pickle here, so we're going to be rushing through some things. Activating training helmets!" Lance screamed slightly at the sudden darkness as everyone started to yell at Coran through the coms, arguing with him with what was considered proper training.

Forget Zarkon. They weren't going to be alive by the time he found them flattened against the planet because the dusty Alteans didn't know how to train theuir Paladins.

Lance took a deep breath and tried clearing his mind, hoping that this would help with feeling Blue, but nothing he did got the memory of falling with a silent Blue, and despite the nudging in the back of his mind, begging to enter his mind, he was still hesitant about the idea of something constantly in his mind like that.

It was scary, to be taught one thing growing up, and then to be told something else millions of miles away from it.

Well, when in doubt, just make sure you're doing better than Keith is.

"Hey, Keith, you still going?" Lance asked aloud, sighing as the g-force forced him back into his chair, though he hoped that it was in a controlled sort of way rather than a

"You know it. You?" Lance allowed a smirk to grow on his face, and thrusted forward with the challenge, egging Keith on with speed in a way that he knew that he wouldn't be able to resist.

It didn't surprise him when he crashed moments later, but allowed himself to feel better knowing that Keith also failed. Shiro didn't, but, then again, Shiro was the only one who had real flying experience outside a simulater.

He could hear Coran's sigh at the lack of success from them, and was quick to usher them all inside, with the other Altean out of sight.

* * *

"Now the most important part of Paladin training is being able to meld your minds and focus on one thing: Voltron. Everything else has to fade away. This technique will be essential every time you form Voltron. So, relax and open your mind. No walls, no secrets between Paladins." Lance cocked his head at the words, and wondered if he should tell Coran how humans act a lot like a Galra in the sense of secrecy and privacy instead of the openness that almost always surrounded the McClain household.

But, as soon as the idea came to him, so did all the unwanted consequences, so Lance didn't bother opening his mouth.

Instead, he quickly focused on the idea of forming Voltron forward in his mind, frowning slightly when he felt Blue's nudging again, but was quick to let her in the surface of his mind before anything else showed, and was proud to say that his Lion appear in front of him before anyone else, no image of any surface thoughts appearing in the in between stage, something that the other humans seemed to struggle with slightly. Before long, he felt the foreign presence of the others in his mind, curiously looking at the surface thoughts that everyone was putting forward, and it took a lot to not instantly reject them and instead let them into the beach that lived in his mind.

Lance could only smile slightly when he felt Hunk try and look through his mind like he was undoubtedly doing to everyone else's, and decided to throw up a random memory from the Garrison to make sure he didn't dig deeper and find the things he wasn't ready to give yet.

Pidge, it seemed, had a different opinion on the others' nosiness.

"Pidge, stop thinking of your girlfriend!"

"Ugh, I wasn't! Hunk, stop rooting around my head!"

"Well, I thought we were open. You can look inside my head hole too." Hunk replied good naturally with a small shrug, which caused the green gremlin to grumble underneath her breath and going back to focusing on clearing her mind of memories of the past rather than letting her Lion through the bond.

Coran had been a bit unclear on that bit, hadn't he?

Lance held his breath as they tried at it again, eyes closed as he felt them all become closer and closer together, or are they getting closer to him? He can feel all of them in his mind, but he's in theirs too and it's not the best feeling in the world but its something he that he could probably live with if it meant taking down Zarkon, but the long they do this the more he begins to doubt the previous statment, and then Hunk's too close to the locked memories and they're all too close to those memories, but they need to form Voltron, but they also can't find out-

They can't find out. Not now. Not like this.

Then there's a snap in his mind, but he's sure that he didn't trigger it no matter how close he actually way to doing so, causing him to suddenly open his eyes in shock and freeze when everything is blue for a moment, but a blink later he's back on the training room floor surrounded by the others, Pidge having already taken off her head band and started to yell about how it was a stupid exercise and that they needed a break.

All he can do is sigh and agree because after that he didn't think he could do anything more.

Coran gives in after some convincing, but nothing can stop the angry Princess who walks in later and demands that they fight the Gladiator, which of course ends in disaster, with Shiro having a flashback and the rest of them (bar Keith of course) struggling to do what was ordered when they have had no experience with combat at all.

(they were all just kids at the end of the day.)

Needless to say, by the end of it, they were all tired, all hungry and all very much done with sight of one another, even the kind Hunk was snappy and short with all of them and the patient Shiro could say nothing and glared at everything like it was the biggest inconvenience to him.

And then they were handcuffed together and forced to feed one another in the name of 'bonding'.

Lance just wanted to go back to sleep.

"Ugh, Keith! Now you've defiled my food goo!" Lance moaned as both his and Keith's hand landed on his plate, and Lance can't even bring a smirk of some kind to his face when the Red Paladin moans back at him in anger of the situation, which makes Shiro snap at them and Pidge groan and Hunk mutter about proper food from Earth (oh, he misses that small blue planet already), and seems all of this was too much for the Princess to take.

"Do humans ever stop complaining?" Despite the argument that Lance has about not all of them being humans, he holds his tounge and lets everyone start shouting, even Coran is now snapping at the others, and it doesn't take long for it to grow into a food goo fight, with everyone dodging the flying green mess and finding new ways to create more of it.

It was fun, and until Allura pointed it out, Lance didn't even notice how he was able to naturally coordinate his attacks with Keith's or move his arm to make sure that Hunk dodge an attack that he didn't even notice.

* * *

Forming Voltron was easier this time.

But, when Lance was washed and dressed back in those Altean pajamas, he could lay in the bed and turn Pidge's words over in his mind.

" _Oh, the princess of what? We're the only ones out here, and she's no princess of ours!"_

Was she Lance's princess? Was she Denices, or Paulyne's or Catharyne's or Skie's or anyones princess anymore? Was she the princess of the ones who survived, the ones who now follow Emprire Zarkon in his quest to take over the universe?

Did she want to be the one to rule over those?

Sighgin, Lance got back out of bed, the room getting brighter due to his motion, and he put his cothes back on, sighing at the comfort the fabric was able to bring to him despite being 1000's of miles away from what he was used to.

(He asked for this.)

He leaves the room with an idea to visit Blue, to work on their bond or for Lance to even work on his quintessence manipulation, to work on his mind and letting Blue inside without causing trouble or to work on something he hasn't for a while, maybe see how well his ability to shift forms was and train that up a little, since he was going to be looking like a human for longer than he'd imagine, but he doesn't make it too steps until he bumps into Corna holding a bucket with bright yellow water, a couple of orange sponges and what seemed to look like a broom but seemed to have way to many buttons to be consided one back on earth.

"Lance, m'boy, what has you up this late in the cycle?" He asks, and Lance couldn't help but smile at the sight of the Altean, with hair that was too bright to be human, and the light blue scales underneath his eyes, lance couldn't help but feel a bit more at home around him, even if he could potentially be a Galran spy, but at this point, Lance could feel himself begin to doubt the first theory, and since there was no second theory, he should probably accept what they have told them to be truth.

"Ah, nothing much, I just couln't sleep so I though I would go around for a wonder." Lance replied with a small smile, but then frowned at the broom in the other's hand. "Are you cleaning? I could lend a hand if you want?"

Coran smiled brightly at the offer, and handed Lance the 'broom' while beginning to walk towards his desination again, now with Lance in tow. "Thank you the offer, we could sure use a few hands to eve start cleaning this place up, after all, it's been 10'000 decapheobs before the last major clean!" His voice holds a fake joy to it, and threatens to break at the mention of how long it's been since Alteans formally walked through these halls.

Maybe Lance should tell him that not all of the Alteans died during Zarkons attack 10'000 decapheobs ago.

* * *

 **A.N. Hey guys, sorry for the long wait for this update. ): Things have been busy and will be busy for a while, but my summer break is almost upon me and I shall be trying to use that time to catch up with all of this :) Leave a comment, and I hope to see you guys soon!**


	6. Episode 6

The walk to the place that needed cleaning was quiet, except for the steady noise of feet tapping on the ground in an even beat, and the thundering heartbeat that whispered in Lance's ear in anticipation of what might happen next.

Lance hated the quiet. It was far louder than any noise that he could create on his own, and he hated the way that it seemed to echo everywhere and surround them and follow them where they went, and he could tell that Coran felt the same way about the awkward silence that followed them down, but every time he seemed to open his mouth he closed it again with a look of regret on his face, meaning that they kept walking through the weird but beautiful castle followed by the awkward silence, leaving Lance to look around as they went on their way.

He didn't think that he would see Altean architecture.

He never thought much about it either. Alteans nowadays had a far more important role than the look of the buildings and the ships of the Galran empire (unless it involved quintessence somehow but even then, there were Galrans who could do that part, as manipulation was clearly not needed), meaning that their designs, even if they had any, would not be needed. But, as he looked at the high lights shining down on the pair of them and the even higher ceilings, all fancied up with a white coat of paint and light blue flourishes, Lance couldn't help but be blown away by the work of his forefathers, amazed by their creativity and astounded by the design, at the way that the metal had clearly been worked in a way to carry the voice of one but yet quiet the voices of many, and even if it was layered by a light sprinkling of dust, it was far better than anything that the Galrans have made in the last 10'000 decapheobs.

"The castle's beautiful." Lance voiced his thoughts aloud as he turned to Coran and smiled at the way that the acoustics of the hallway made his voice travel further down than he intended, which caused the older Altean to laugh slightly.

"Yes, it is. Y'know, it's my grandfather who designed it, why, I must have been your age myself when I watched him command his men to build it. He would have been happy to see that it has not only outlived him, but planet Altea too." He replied joyfully, but the happiness didn't seem to reach his eyes at the last part.

Lance swallowed and looked directly ahead, trying not to look back the other he was keeping company.

What are you supposed to say to that?

The awkward silence is back, and, somehow, it manages to be heavier on them than last time, practically holding his shoulders down now as it walks in step with him, only a stride behind.

Then, relief filled him when Coran stopped at a large door and pulled along his equipment as they walked into the large room, though much smaller than the observation deck where the castle was controlled, not that he had had time to get a proper look of the room. There were various work stations dotted around the room that carried towering stacks of dust, clearly not having been used for longer than the 10'000 year gap that the two Alteans have spent in status and the rest of the universe in outright war, and the air tasted surprisingly of stale ozone, and Lance wondered if there was any sort of ventilation in this room, because the rest if the castle seemed to be free of this problem.

But then again, the main attraction of the room, the rather small looking Balmera crystal that light up bright with pure purified quintessence, much difference from the unpurified oone that laid on the flight deck, was probably the reason for the lack of ventilation, as the purification of quintessence was... difficult to predict the outcomes of, expecially back when the research on this crystal in full force. After all, 10'000 decapheobs , no one really knew what they were doing with quintessence, how it worked, how to manipulate it. If it went wrong...

Better to lock it in one section rather than risk it contaminating the rest of the castle.

Coran was oblivious to Lance's thoughts, and he pulled out the thing that Lance didn't want to call a duster but had no better way to describe the furry sponge, and began to wipe down the first work station, but when he notices Lance's staring, he stops what he's doing looks up to the crystal himself.

"Ah, yes, the Balmera crystal, nothing like that in the universe, except another one like it of course." He replies to Lance's staring, and Lance embarrassingly draws his eyes away from it and down towards the computer like device that laid right beneath it.

He's seen these before, it was how he learned about quintessence in the first place, he even has one in his pocket right now, a much smaller one, a purified one, currently dancing between his fingers as they played with the calming quintessence it radiated, and yet...

He had never properly seen one quite like this, quite this big, quite this pure.

He didn't think it was even possible.

"A Balmera?" Lance asked, because while he knows about them, of course he knows about them, he could help but wonder what it was like on one without the Galran empire breathing down on it and demanding its recourses, wonder what it was like to not have to worry about meeting the demands of the hungry, wonder what it was like to be free.

(Maybe that's why he doesn't seem to like these Alteans. They know what it's like to be free, and yet not even notice the privilege that they live in. He, however, has known war and only knows war. He is fluent in the language and has grown up yarning the gift that the other's didn't know they had: freedom, or at the very least, the illusion of it. )

"A Balmera is an ancient, petrified animal, older than the Lions in fact. See, their bodies create these crystals naturally, and which can be used to power all sorts of things, as it turned out. Before then, people only used them to decorate their homes!" Coran laughed, and Lance laughed along too, but he could feel his stomach drop. They kept these powerful, life threatening things as ornaments! "It wasn't until an Altean lent on one accidently and caused a power surge big enough to break every light in the city that we realized how much potential that carried." Coran reminisced, and Lance could feel his heart flurry and his thought nearly close up.

It's a wonder how the Altean race didn't kill themselves off before the Galra came along.

Sighing, Lance grabbed the same duster sponge from the cleaning supplies that Coran had brought with them and moved to a different work stand and stated wiping, frowning at the way that it managed to actually catch the dust rather than wiping it everywhere.

Huh. Weird, but cool.

"You know Coran, we don't have things like this on Earth." Lance stated, eyes wide as he watched the dust disappeared into nothing, as the sponge was a clean as before he started.

"But how do you get all of the dust off then?" Coran asked as he finished off the podium that he was on and beginning to now polish it. Lance looked up to his eyeline and shrugged.

"I mean, we wipe it off, and it lands on the floor, and then we clean that up, but now that I've said that out loud, it does sound like a lot of effort." Lance replied, marveling at the now clean surface before walking over to Coan and getting the same bottle as him, taking a small sniff of the turpentine fragrance, and he wondered how it was able to keep that smell after so long.

"You Earthlings seem to do things in such a roundabout way." Lance's round ears prickled at the name. "Why, not a few varga ago Number Five asked where a power outlet was for their computer, they call it a laptop, and they seemed very upset when I told her that the technology we use is always connected to these crystals, and, as such, we don't have a use of having a central station for all our power. They seemed very alarmed by this." None of this came to a surprise to Lance, but the genuine concern in Coran's voice made him giggle slightly, but, at the same time he did understand Pidge's concern.

These crystals had been compared by his hermana to nuclear power stations before, her words being 'Don't you know how dangerous they are, stupid? They're basically travel sized nuclear plants!'

(Catharyne and Paulyne then proceeded to have an argument over what was more dangerous: humans being in control of nuclear weapons or him having a Blue crystal to help him study his own quintessece.)

"Coran, we are the only people on our planet that have left the solar system, we haven't even gotten past nuclear power-"

"You can harness nuclear energy!?" Coran had gone from concern to downright worried at this point, only making Lance's smile wider. "How are none of you suffering from dangerous radiation poisoning? How long have you humans been doing this?" Lance pierced his lips, and thought about it for a second, before shaking his head.

"For a long while, and we have been using so many safe guards to make sure that it doesn't happen, but that isn't the point yet. The point is, none of us have seen technology like this before, we don't know how to use it, and we are all going to be awe struck by it." Lance replied, going back to his polishing, letting the familiar smell fill the room as he rubbed it into the work station, closing his eyes as Coran understood what he was saying.

"So, you all met each other on this 'Earth', then?" Coran asked guardedly, now weary of the planet that harnesses the power that comes from splitting atoms, and Lance nods his head, but then he realized that Coran was far too busy cleaning, on his second work station now, to be able to see his agreement.

"Yeah, I met Hunk first, and the Keith and then finally Pidge, at a space school on Earth." He answered, before delving deeper. "Hunk was my assigned roommate, and I knew Keith, but he clearly didn't know me, and then me and Hunk met Pidge when she was assigned as our teammate."

"She?" Coran asked, looking up with a small smile on his face, making Lance realize his mistake.

And he had gone so long calling Pidge a boy out loud too.

(At least he didn't do it in front of her, otherwise he'll have to explain, and there was no good way of saying 'your quintessence is female' without sounding like an absolute lunitic.)

"Hmm, do you know what she is using male pronouns? Is it some sort of custom on your planet or-"

"Oh no, no it's not, or at least, it's not where I grow up, I don't know for the rest of the planet. I-I don't actually know why she is pretending to be a male, I'm not supposed to know her gender you see, but I thought it was best to wait around for her to tell us, y'know, trust and all that jazz." Lance stuttered, a blush rising on his face, making Coran laugh.

"Don't worry, your secret is safe with me." He winked, and then he digged through his box of cleaning supplies and brought what seemed to be another sort of polish, though this one may have aimed for the floor, as he squirted a quick spray onto the floor, and then started using his weird, multibuttoned mop to clean the non-existent mud form the cool metal floor, before stopping and looking back up at Lance.

"Hang on just a tick, it might be a custom on your planet?" Coran asked, and Lance smiled brightly in return.

"I mean, it might be, because there are so many countries on our planet, they're like groups of people who follow one leader, and they are all so different, as in they all talk different languages and have different beliefs and different holidays and such. Like for example, Shiro is from Japan, so he can probably speak Japanese as well as English, while Pidge is from Italy, so she speaks Italian as well, and Hunk and Keith are both born in America, though I'm pretty sure that Hunk has some sort of Pacific Island background, though I'm not too sure on Keith, but who knows with that guy, he might even be half alien for all we know." Lance laughed, and then paused, looking at Coran's facial expressions, as this all went clean over his head but seemed enthralled by the diversity of Voltron, even if they were all from one planet.

"And what about you, what is the area that you come from called?" He asked, leaning against the mop and smiling as Lance sighed.

"I was born and raised on an island called Cuba, raised on farmland, but we didn't use it for farming, not after my father died and my mother couldn't keep up with several cows, a few chickens and lots of children at one time." He started, before pausing for a tick.

He could tell Corna, couldn't he? It's not like he would go straight to the team with the information about his background (but they needed to know soon, sooner than later anyway), but there was no telling that he wouldn't go straight to Allura and tell her, and then they would both ask where the rest of the Alteans were and wouldn't that be a great way to start the day and their adventure to save the universe from Zarkon?

But, they needed to know sooner than later...

Now would be a good time to do it, when they weren't in any danger, when there was no proper relationship to break...

"I guess my family are a bit strange though, because-" Lance went to more, but was rudely interrupted by the intercom, the same one that Allura had used earlier that day, started up.

 _"Hey, Coran, where ever you are in the castle, so uh, I couldn't sleep, so I thought that I should make some cookies in the kitchen you showed us, because cookies are always good for when you can't sleep, and I put them on the tray and then into the oven-"_

Coran's faced dropped as he looked at Lance. "That kitchen doesn't haven an oven." He muttered as he placed the mop against the work station and quickly left the room, presumably to save Hunk from whatever he had just made.

 _"-And then I left them for about, what a minute, and then it started sparking what do I-OH GOD THERE'S A FIRE HOLY SH-"_

The intercom shut off there.

Lance hoped his Hunk was okay as he picked up the mop and started to clean the floor for Coran, hoping to the stars that he was using the right chemical to make the floor shiny.

And then, when that was done, he packed up the cleaning supplies and left box and the mop in plain sight, next to the work station closest to the door, and took one look at the crystal, still shining bright, before leaving the room and getting some shut eye.

He'll have to just tell him next time, whenever that next time may be.

(He wishes it was soon, and never to come, all at the same time.)

x-x-x

 **A.N. Okay, so I wrote this all on Thursday, with yesterday being editing when I got too frustrated with season six to continue watching it. My opinion? When I finished it, I low-key hated Keith and Allura, because the former takes the lead after being missing for the last two seasons and the latter for becoming something akin to a Mary Sue. Now though, I can really appreciate the last fight, Lotor has become my favourite villain of all times, even topping Azula from Avatar, the ending was a great place to finish the second act, and, after reading a post about Kuron, I have to think that he is also one of my favourite antiheroes? Is he an antihero? What is he considered? Nevertheless, the buildup and his characterisation is beautiful, just have a closer look at the DnD episode!**

 **That isn't to say that there isn't improvements to be made (something they have introduced has thrown a spanner in my work and things are going to be changing a LOT to make this fic work), but I guess that's what fanfiction is for XD**

 **Talking about fanfiction... It have given me some pretty nice plot bunnies, so watch out for those :D**

 **Comment below what you thought of the chapter and PLEASE NO SPOILERS GUYS! I have seen the new season (have an rant about it on my tumblr, the link is below for a reason...), but some people haven't seen it yet...**


	7. Episode 7

It surprised Lance as to how quickly he, and the rest of the humans, got used to everything.

After the first couple of days of fighting the Galra and collecting the Lions and starting the really hard training courtesy of Allura, everything seems to fall into place for everyone. They all get used to the new, shorter, day cycle that the castle has, and they all get used to the fact that they needed to educate Allura and Coran about what Earth was like and they all get used to the idea of having sentient robotic Lions that could join together and form a bigger sentient robotic Humanoid that was, in all respects, fucking badass.

As there are things they need to adapt to as a group, there's things they need to do on their own. Pidge needed to learn to trust the rest of the team with whatever secret she was hiding along with her gender (not that Lance could say much about it), Keith needed to learn to let his barriers down for just a bit, and relax with the lot of them. Hunk needed to understand that this all was real, that people were getting hurt, and Shiro needed to understand that depriving himself of sleep and continuously working out would not help these people out.

Lance knew exactly what he needed to do, he needed to tell the truth to everyone, to let them know everything that he knew, but every time he found what could be the perfect situation, the words got clogged in his throat, unable to leave.

He wasn't stupid, no, he knew something like this might happened. He knew the risks of coming to space, what it would come with it, the dangers as well as the add-ons. He hadn't spent sleepless nights with Paulyne talking over the phone while in the Garrison, or on the roof watching the stars together when he was younger and back at home, about _'what if's'_ for , this isn't what they had talked about. They had talked fighting the Galran despite not being able to get to space. They had whispered about working with rebels, with making sure that they never said that they were Alteans in fear that they would be killed before they could explain everything, and instead hiding as another type of alien until they could be trusted but the others around them, and until they trusted those they worked with.

They were going to use their druidic powers for good, never to use it against someone or cause others pain. They were going to help save the universe, and prove that not all of their species were bad, and prove that not all Galrans were bad as well, a childish dream that they've carried ever since Lance was old enough to have a dream like that and now realised how unrealistic it all seemed, not that it had deterred him nor his sister from it, even if he was the more vocal one.

But this, being the Blue Paladin and flying off into space with Humans and finding pure Alteans are supposed to be dead, this wasn't part of the plan.

Paulyne was going to kill him. No question about it.

Sighing, Lance applied some more of the weird but familiar goo that Coran had given him underneath his eye, careful to avoid his markings that were out, before wiping his sticky fingers on a blue wet cloth, and starting the ticker on the counter for five doboshes, and listened to the ticking noise that soundly slightly too slow to what he was used to. Smiling into the mirror in front of him, he admired the weird contrast between the green of the face mask and the blue of his markings and the random strand of blue hair that got too close to the sticky substance, making sure to push it back to make sure none of the face mask went into his hair and caused him issues later.

It felt way too relieving to have his natural skin out, instead of his human mask. It felt like his face could finally breathe after so long at the Garrison hiding it due to sharing a room with Hunk, but now he didn't have that problem, meaning that he could finally sleep without the constant anxiety of having the mask fade away in his sleep. It was like relaxing a tense muscle after using it for so long, and it felt so nice to be able to relax like he would at home. But, at the same time, it caused anxiety, making him self aware of how mong he had been in the room by himself, how long he had until people came looking for him, how quiet the castle was and how thick the walls were.

He would never know if they were coming, an if they didn't knock-

The ticker on the counter started buzzing; his five doboshes were up. Picking up the wet cloth, he started to rinse off his face, and he smiled at the feeling of the weird material over his skin and his markings as it quickly picked up all of the face mask with no residue, leaving his skin smooth and sparkling.

Finally, before he left the room, he let his skin ripple, letting his own quintessence wash over him as he faded his marking until they were nothing and the blue pigmentation left his hair, leaving it brown. Finally, he felt his ears pinch as they became round and his eyes ache for a second as they too changed, to become the more human like rather than the multicoloured pupils that he shared with Allura and Coran.

Finally, he was done and presentable, able to leave his room without having to worry about the others, now, all he had to worry about was the training that he would be put under today. He goes to leave, and his eye catches the white crystal that radiated from his bedside table.

He wouldn't need it today, it was only training.

* * *

It wasn't just training today, oh no, it was also finding out that there was an entire species of cute cuddly aliens not even a mile away from the castle's location. Not that they were bad for his first alien species to meet (because technically, the Alteans didn't count if he was one and he has yet to meet a Galran even if he was supposed to be helping fight a war against them).

And that wasn't enough, oh no, they just _had_ to be attacked by a ginormous robot beast thing that Shiro apparently recognised. It was terrifyingly huge, the same size of Voltron when it was fully formed. Humanoid shaped with a magnetic ball for a weapon that hurt like hell when they were hit with. It was extremely lucky in Lance's opinion that Shiro had fought it (Lance didn't think it was an 'it' when Shiro had first fought it in the arena, but he knew what druids were like, he was one after all, he knew from hands on experience that it wasn't all glowing stones and colourful lights) before it became what the Paladins fought.

But, they had won (by the scrape of their teeth, but, no matter how grateful he was, Lance was _not_ going to say thanks to Keith for pulling out a sword of thin air, just, no), and now they got to celebrate, which would be pretty cool, even if it was only just going to be the Arusians, the Paladins and the two Alteans in attendance.

Lance wasn't the only one to think that having a party would be a great idea, Hunk couldn't wait to be in charge of all the food (even if he didn't recognise it), and Coran seemed to be pulling out all the stocks for this event, going into all the storage that the castle had (and it was a lot, even when you took out everything that had expired in the last 10,000 decapheobs) and getting things out, from some weirdly named drink called Nunville (Lance didn't trust it one bit) to some odd looking trumpet that sounded more like a violin, insisting that he played a few songs to their guests, but for some reason, Lance got the idea that this would only be happening after he drunk the weirdly named drink that he mentioned before.

Not everyone was happy about this event happening, of course. Pidge had frowned when Lance had gone into Green's hangers to announce the news, before looking back down at her computer and typing at her insanely fast typing past, to the point that Lance is now convinced that she is just keyboard smashing rather than typing. Shiro had nodded when he had bumped into him on his way to his bedroom, and Shiro had smiled and said that the event was good for Voltron, but there was a weariness in his eyes that Lance knew from his Grandfather, and he didn't have to read Shiro's mind nor his quintessence to see that he was anxious and paranoid of the upcoming event.

But, Lance was excited for the event. A party with cute cuddly aliens, celebrating the fact that they were all alive after the terrible ordeal that was that weird robot beast thing (they really needed a name for that), nothing could go wrong!

(A lot could go wrong, like Coran cooking food instead of someone who could cook or time catching up with the castle and something breaking down because of it, but they were low risks, and they were ones that everyone was going to take.)

Of course, no one seemed to know what they were doing after the party, after all the cute Arusians had gone back to their village and self-sacrificing to the gods, but could they be blamed? They were supposed to be taking on the _entire_ Galran Empire, no one really knew how you were supposed to start off with that.

Well, Lance had a couple of ideas, like going to the Blade of Marmora or some other rebel group for information and then going from there, which did seem better than just going from planet to planet, freeing them from Zarkon's grasp (not that it was a bad plan, just a long and boring plan riddled with holes). The problem with his plan to go to the Blades would be the fact that he would have to explain how he knew about the Blade of Marmora, and to do that he would have to explain that he was Altean and, yeah, while it was a needed thing to do, he knew for a fact that some people would not be taking it well, as well as the other questions that it would bring up.

They were going to ask about the other Alteans, about why he didn't tell them after so long. They were going to ask about his family and about the rebels and about Earth and so many other things that Lance either didn't care about or he didn't have the answer to. On one hand, he wanted to avoid it completely, never tell them anything about his heritage, which was a bad thing because it was inevitable, in the end. On the other hand, the suspense was killing him, he just wanted to scream it from the top of his lungs at this point, but because of the fact that people will have questions and they just simply didn't have the time between now and the party, Lance had just resigned to tell them afterwards.

So, he helped Coran set up the hall and he listened to Allura's ranting about how it needed to be perfect, then he helped entertain Hunk while he cooked and then he collected the other Paladins from whatever they were doing, Keith from his room, Shiro from the training deck and Pidge from one of the pods, and then it was time for the party to start.


	8. Episode 8

Allura opened the castle's doors just as the sun started to set, and the Paladins stand in a row and smile and greet as the small Arusians started to treacle in, smiles on their own faces as they gawk at the building and the technology and the power that the castle held over all of them. Not that Lance blamed them, as it was one thing to hear it from Catharyne as bedtime stories and another to see the technology of his ancestors in person.

Once the Arusians stopped coming in, the Paladins were told to mingle with their guests, to entertain them and to converse with them, something that Lance took in with stride, going from one group of small aliens to another and smiling at them, answering their questions about serving the 'Lion Goddess' as they called Allura. When he turned around to look at the other Paladins, they looked a bit more awkward about what they were doing, Keith just shadowing Hunk, probably in fear that he would do something wrong, Shiro looking at the entrances with a frown on his face and Pidge not even to try to talk to the Arusians.

When Allura stood up on the top of the staircase with the promise of a performance from their guests, Lance silently walked towards Hunk and Keith as they watched the performance with a small look of doubt on their faces as they started to climb onto one another to give themselves more height and then engaged in a small mock fight, where the pair that was supposed to be Voltron fell several times before the 'monster' did, causing them to cheer loudly at Voltron's win.

It was slightly morbid when Lance thought about it too much, watching the cute aliens re-enact something that everyone almost died in, but at the same time it was pretty cute too, and it was their way of thinking Voltron, so he'll let it slide.

"We need to get something like that," Hunk muttered as the crowd dispersed and look at the refreshments now on offer on floating trays, Lance himself picking a half-filled cup filled with a yellow looking liquid. Yummy.

"What do you mean?" Keith asked while looking inside a cup of his own, a look of concern filling his face.

"You know, like, a team cheer that we do, to boast moral before we go into a fight," Hunk proposed, and Lance let a grin grow on his face. It sounded like something that Skye would say.

"Okay, that sounds like a good idea," Lance said, thinking about what it should be, before an idea popped into his mind, "So, what about… 'I say 'Vol' and you say 'Tron'. Vol!'" Lance said loudly, gaining some attention from the other Arusians around them.

"Uh…" there was a look of confusion on Keith's face, causing worry to start growing in Lance's stomach. There was no way that Keith could get this wrong though, the instructions were just there, he could do that at least, right?

"Voltron?"

Clearly that was not the case.

"No no no! The instructions are part of the cheer, so when I say 'Vol', you say…" Lance prompted, ignoring the snickers that Hunk tried to repress and Keith's look of complete and utter confusion.

"Vol… Tron?" he asked again, making Lance want to hit himself. How in the 'Verse did Keith not know what to do?! Not only was this a common thing on Earth, but Keith was the human one out of the two of them! Why did Lance know more Earth culture than Keith did?

"Never mind," Lance muttered as he took a sip of his drink, blinking in surprise at the taste. It was… something, to say the least. Worse than food goo, sure, but it didn't taste as bad as the smell of the Paladin's lunch did that Coran made up for them a couple of days ago, so there was a plus. Taking another sniff at the sour smell, Lance scrunched his nose up. Maybe it would make a better hair product than drink?

Keith must have taken his reaction as a sign to try it himself, as he took a big gulp and promptly spat it back out in shock, making Lance giggle at the shock on Keith's face, the look of betrayal clear on his face and murder in his eyes.

"How on Earth did you not spit that out," Keith ask softly as he stared back at the drink while Hunk just put his back on one of the floating trays and instead picked up one of the snacks that they were giving out, something that looked like it was supposed to be a sweet from Earth but was probably something savoury that Coran made up quickly, so Lance was in no rush to try them.

"Man, you should have seen what Lance ate at the Garrison," Hunk muttered as he took a sniff of the food on the end of what seemed to be plastic sticks, "He ate the meatloaf willingly. Willingly! I swear you have to be some sort of alien to enjoy that."

Lance's entire body went cold.

The hand on the cup felt numb, and could hear the blood rushing in his ears, his round and ugly ears, not the ones he was born with. He wasn't human, not like they thought he was, not like he pretended he was. On Earth, that was fine, it was okay to pretend that he was like the other kids he went to school with, just like the other people he shared the blue planet with.

But, out here in the middle of space, where his species was part of the enemy and the people who were supposed to have his back and him theirs had no idea about what he was, what he could do, what he could have become in things were different. The people who thought they were last of their kind were bring lied to their faces.

He can't keep this a secret any longer, they didn't deserve that. Not sweet Hunk who wanted the best of everyone, not headstrong Keith who isn't as bad as he first seemed, not Pidge who is really a girl and not Shiro who probably needed a break from all of this. Not Allura who probably couldn't take another hit like learning her species now served the people who destroyed their planet, not Coran who acted like a rock for them and supported them in ways that they have yet to properly see. None of them knew about this war before they were thrusted into it, they didn't have the same mental preparation that Lance, they didn't choose to be here like Lance did.

Lance knew what he was getting into, they didn't. The least he could do to them is be honest to them.

"Lance, are you okay?" Lance looked up at Hunk with a soft smile but his breath in his throat, making it hard to swallow down another sip of the drink, as he wasn't sure that the sour aftertaste was just from the drink.

"I think the Nunvill has gotten to my head, I'm going to take a breather," Lance replied lowly, quickly leaving the pair of Paladins to socialise on their own.

"I liked that meatloaf," Keith muttered as he left, making Lance chuckle as he walked out of the entrance hall. Of course, Keith liked the meatloaf, it wasn't bad in the first place, Hunk was just exaggerating.

* * *

It was easy to open up the star map on the observation deck, easy to manipulate is across the known 'Verse, but it was less easy to look for the familiar solar system that he grew up on and harder to spot the stars that he used to admire and talk under with his siblings about what the future held for them. It didn't take him long to give up on the idea of finding the milky way, and instead just admired the stars he reached, taking in the Altean characters in and slowly translated them in his head, taking in each of the planet's given name by his ancestors 10 millennium back.

"Mind if I join you?" Lance looked up to see Coran looking at him with sad eyes, and Lance smiled back, nodding to the other man, and going back to the map, sighing softly as the older man took a seat next to him.

"What was your planet like?" Lance asked, much to his surprise. He's never wanted to find out about Altea before, never felt the need to. He had his quintessence, he had his crystals, he had the war and their future, he never felt the need to learn about the past and how things came to be as they were. He never wanted to know what his forefathers were like on their home planet and what his ancestors did to serve Zarkon; that was Catharyne's passion, not his.

But here, in the middle of the space war that he wanted to help in for as long as he knew about it, he couldn't help but wonder what it was like all those years past.

He supposed that this is what Catharyne's train of thought usually was.

"It was beautiful," Coran said quietly. Lance hummed in agreement, not saying anything, letting the elder Altean get his thoughts and no doubt grief off his chest. He hadn't reacted like Allura when they woke up. Allura grew angry quickly, and he didn't doubt that she had let that go yet, which made Lance weary for what she would do in the future because of it. Now it was only pushing him and the Paladins with their training, but if she didn't calm down then who knows what she would do with her grief.

Coran was different, though. He didn't seem angry to learn that his planet had been destroyed by Zarkon, he didn't seem to react to the fact that he had been asleep for 10'000 decapheobs either though. He acted like a stone pillar for Allura to lean on, which was great, Lance supposed, if you were Allura and needed that emotional support from the only other Altean left in the universe (not really, but they didn't know that).

(They didn't know that yet at least.)

"There were the bright blue skies and the purple juniberry fields that spanned for walks upon walks. And the people!" Coran turned to look at him, the map in front of them now forgotten. "You have to remember my boy, Altea was not only the home planet to Alteans, but almost the central hub for diplomacy and meetings, so our planet was considered the neutral ground for wars and arguments between planets and even just personal conflicts, so you were just as likely to see an alien as you were to see an Altean!" There was mirth in his voice, but tears in his eyes, enough for him to realise and turn to look back at the map, the planets floating idly in front of them.

"I think that I miss the rain the most," Coran said quietly after some silence and Lance smiled brightly at that. He didn't have much experience with rain, you never got too much of it in Cuba nor the desert, but the little times that water came down from the sky, it was a beauty to behold.

"I loved the rain on Earth," Lance supplied, smiling at the almost forgotten memories, "it always felt so cool on my skin and refreshing to be in." Coran let out a hearty laugh at his words, making Lance jump.

"The rain on Altea was nothing like that Number Three! It was more like rocks. Razor-sharp and boiling-hot. Oh, they could knock a hole right in your head," Lance smiled at Coran's words, who smiled back at him kindly, his eyes still filled with grief. Standing up, Lance stretched his arms above his head, before picking up his cup and taking another swig of the Nunvill before deciding that, yeah, it was not a drink for him. Coran stood up too, laughing at the sour face that he pulled at the taste, and beginning to describe the other uses for Nunvill, taking the cup from Lance and, demonstrating on his moustache, he described how to apply the 'drink' to hair, making Lance laugh as they began to leave the crystal room.

"Hey, Coran, there's something that I should probably tell you, and the others," Lance started casually and as they began to leave, but before he could say more, before he could answer Coran's question of 'And what would that be my boy?', the hairs on the back of his neck stood up on point and his eyes immediately went towards the threat, the drone that Pidge had reprogrammed when they were on Sendek's ship.

Oh, he was just overreacting. There was nothing wrong with it-

It flashed red.

That was not the drone that Pidge reprogrammed.

The next split second happened in slow motion.

His first action was to shout Coran's name. He didn't hear his own voice; it was hard to tell if he gave Coran any warning. He second action was to move. He ran towards Coran; he was only a few steps away from him. His final action was to push. He shoved Coran as hard as he could.

The last thing he remembered was the feeling of being lit on fire.

.

.

.

" _-at happ-"_

 _._

 _._

 _._

" _Crst-"_

 _._

 _._

 _._

" _-nce, Lance!"_

 _._

 _._

 _._

" _Can't be... imposs-"_

 _._

 _._

 _._

" _Altean?"_


	9. Episode 9

_Lance remembered the first time that he met Catharyne's girlfriend._

 _He was what, thirteen, almost fourteen? By this point he was allowed to practice and experiment on his own, but he had to explain what he was doing to someone, and he had to ask for help when he got stuck and didn't understand, or he had to talk out what would be considered a 'risky' move to others before performing them. Your typical health and safety produces._

 _Of course, he didn't follow these rules, why would he? No one on this planet could do what he was teaching himself, not even Abuela, who was the best out of all of them, so he just practiced on some mice that he managed to steel from Paulyne, not that she cared too much if he told her that he was taking it, though he thought that she might mind a little if she knew why he wanted them for the first place._

 _Not matter; he wanted, no, he_ needed _to get better. If there were these aliens out there who were out to get them, these Galrans, then there was no telling when they would get to Earth, and there was no uncertainty about it, not with the way that Denise described them to him. Bloodthirsty creatures who get their energies from heathy, prospering planets, destroying them without a regret in the 'Verse._

 _So, when he was reading that heavy tome that was in Galran, a language that was harder to learn than English it seemed, and found out that Blue-Cored Alteans could learn to read minds (further reading said that the process was too long and complicated as to call it simply mind reading, but Lance was thirteen, almost fourteen, but not quite, so he was young enough, innocent enough to be able to get away with the simple term of 'mindreading'), well, anyway to help his family was a good way._

 _But that's not the point. The point was that he was thirteen, almost fourteen, when he first met Catharyne's girlfriend._

 _She was human, and subjectively pretty, internet pretty. Long, bleach blonde hair, the ends dead and dry, and brilliantly cold blue eyes that reminded Lance vaguely of something he had yet to see, something that he had yet to meet. She had such a lovely icy smile, a body that had a figure to die for, and a tight grip on Catharyne's hand that would have been almost painful was it someone else. Long, purple nails of plastic hung off the tips of her fingers and almost dug into his sister's skin and, when she met him for the first time, her head tilted in the prettiest of ways, almost non-human like, but not in a way that could be described as 'alien'._

 _Lance was probably the most openminded out of his family, even Skye had her moments of displeasure of humans, mainly due to her perfectionist streak and the way that she idolised Paulyne. Lance liked everyone he met, he got on with everyone he met, he was almost always friends with everyone he met, and never seemed to care that he was a different species to them, sometimes never seemed to notice even. But at this moment, when he looked at this magazine pretty girl for the first time, he instantly disliked her, disliked her pale, smooth and acne free skin, and he disliked her smile that seemed to show off one too many of her white pearly teeth._

 _Everything would have been resolved sooner if he had said something._

 _But Lance had been thirteen, almost fourteen, but not quite, when he met her, so he was young enough, innocent enough to be able to get away with the simple idea that everything would turn out right._

* * *

When Lance wakes up, its with a head full of pain and a solid slice of regret.

Of course, he doesn't regret pushing Coran out of the way, he would never. Coran was such a nice person, despite his first thoughts on the elder Altean, and is someone who Lance wants to consider a friend in the future, maybe when all this had blown over (haha, blown over, that was such a good pun, shame that no one could hear his thoughts for that split second) of course. But, still, being blown up by a bomb was not on his to do list that day, so he regretted having done that.

Ugh, this is the reason why he should have learned to teleport, but no, Denise just _had_ to be 'responsible' and reject his idea and suggest that he revise fir school instead, said it would turn out better for him.

(And if the main reason for that was because the last time he was taught a high-level thing he ended up almost wiping someone's entire mind, well, no one was going to say that aloud, were they?)

He wasn't quite sure what had happened for everything to end up the way that it was, but as Lance stared blearily at the Galran who was talking to the screen in growls and rolling tongues (he'll start to translate when his brain wasn't about to fly out of his head), he didn't think that it was the intentions of his teammates, or at least, he hope it wasn't. There was again the chance that Allura may have invited them on, may it be under the guise of hospitality (very unlikely, she seemed to have a grudge against them, or he thought that she had a grudge against them, with how often she curses their existence, he was sure that Mama would have washed her mouth out if she was here to listen to the language that she used, princess or not) or the fact that she still could be a spy (just as unlikely, as Lance doubted that Allura would be able to do it by herself and Coran would have been hurt by the bomb, but then again, it did explain why Coran came into the ro- no, no, they were not spies!).

(Or it was at least a very low chance at this point….)

In any case, Lance's head hurt, he was laying on his side, his back on actual fire while this Galran dude just kept talking to the screen.

He closed his eyes again, ignoring the report that the Galran was surely rattling off to the screen, and focused on breathing. In and out. In and out. In and-

"My my, I never though I would actually encounter an Altean for a Paladin, let alone a druid," Lance slowly opened his eyes at the use of butchered Altean - the growls and rolling tough clashing with what is supposed to be a softly spoken language – and he didn't even have the energy to flinch at how close to his face the Galran had gotten, his fake, quintessence-powered eye almost close enough to lick (the only thing stopping him was the idea of a long drawn out and painful death). Shiro had started to shout in the background, started to threaten and scream but Lance's head hurt, and English was now as hard to comprehend as Galran was (the downfalls to not having anyone speak his native language now hitting him in the head and making his headache worse), so Shiro's warning were just a mash of sharp vowels and harsh constants in his mind rather than actual translations or meaning.

The Galran however, didn't seemed to have any trouble at all with what Shiro had to say, letting out a small chuckle at Shiro's warnings, but his eyes did not stray from Lance.

"Which master did you betray to find yourself here, little druid?" Lance's breath got stuck in his lungs for a second, the idea of working for the Zarkon was sickening enough as a thought, let alone calling him or any of his commanders his 'master'. But, at the same time, if he said that he never worked for the Galra in the first place, then he would ask about his family, and he didn't run away with the Blue Lion, leaving them on the backwater planet all by themselves only to sell them out.

(Not that he intended to run away with the Blue Lion, they're so going to ground him for that, but still, the point still stood.)

"Your Altean is horrible," Lance muttered as his eyes closed again, unwillingly, as he didn't really want to show any sort of weakness in front of the commander, but he was tired, and his head hurt, and Shiro was still shouting extremely loudly in English, which was just as hard to translate as Galran was when you had an almighty headache with the possibility of a concussion.

The Galra let out a chuckle at Lance's words, breathing right in his face that made Lance want to gag. The Galran moved away from him, giving Lance the hope that he would be able to sleep in peace now, would be able to wake up later with the whole situation worked out, the rest of the Paladins plus Allura and Coran looking all well and dandy, then he could just tell them about him being Altean and be done with it.

A prickling sensation at his neck made his eyes shoot open and widen with fear.

"Relax little druid," the words only made the hairs on the back of his neck stand up, "it's only some quintessence, nothing that you haven't dealt with before." Lance's breath began to speed up as the Galran took the needle out of his neck and he left the way that it seemed to crawl underneath his skin, flowing from his neck to his heart to his lungs to his heart again before quickly being distributed to the rest of his body.

It was a foreign feeling, one that he didn't enjoy at all. He still had the bone tiredness and he still wanted to just close his eyes and rest, but he was now awake and alert, aware of everything in the room, the Galran typing away near the purple, infected, crystal, Shiro trying to get his attention, trying to make sure Lance was alright while still telling the commander come ungodly words, aware of the dust particles that landed on him. The pain in his back and his head had gone down to a pulsing sort of pain rather than an inferno.

"Now, that seems much better, doesn't it?" it was said in Galran this time, something that Lance was aware of in the back of his mind, his mind that didn't seemed to hurt as much as it should. Lance only blinked in reply. The Galran goes to open his mouth again, but is interrupted by an explosion, one that he doesn't seemed to expect, and a cry from his subordinate.

"The main engine just shorted out!"

"We have a saboteur," the commander snarled out, giving Lance some hope. Who knows who it actually was, if it was the missing Paladins or one of the Alteans, but they seemed to have done it in the nick of time. "Find him and take them out." The subordinate nodded to his orders, and walked off down a corridor along with some of their sentries.

The commander looked back down at Lance, who still hadn't moved from his position that he woke up in.

"Let's make a deal," he said as he walked over, his steps echoing in the otherwise silent room, "Sell out this 'teammate' of yours, and I'll talk to Emperor Zarkon, give you a pardon from your past crimes of treason against the Empire for helping us take down Voltron."

* * *

" _You're hiding something from me Catharyne, and you know I hate it so when you hide something from me, your soulmate," Lance, now fourteen but still so innocent, paused on his way to his room, one of his mice squirming in his hands as he heard Catharyne argue with her girlfriend over what they were 'hiding'. Mama didn't seem to mind when she had her over, didn't seem to mind hiding her true self for the sake of Catharyne's girlfriend, and neither did Denise._

 _Paulyne hated it, often taking Skye out when they were over and being 'lovey-dovey' as she called it. Abuela and Grandfather were often than not in the barn anyways, and Lance never minded, even if he wasn't really a big fan of who she was as a person._

" _You know, if you're so adamant about keeping this from me, then I don't think that we should be together anymore…" her words were innocent, rolling off her tough like a sweet honey from the bees that Denise had started to care for, but it sickened Lance, making him walk right into his room, locking the door, double and triple checking the lock on the door to make sure that no one would be able to get in and putting the mouse into its new cage._

 _Taking a deep breath, he crouched down to make eye contact with it, smiling when he left the quintessence protecting the mouse's mind give away to him as he slowly slipped in to have a peak inside, feeling his own eyes change colour and his marking beginning to glow a beautiful despite trying to hide them due to the 'guests'._

 _There's something that he needed to practice before he did it for real._

* * *

 **A.N. Wow, so there's only about two chapters left of this fic! This one is a little bit shorter, but that's mainly because of what is needing to happen in the next chapter, and i couldn't split that into two, could I?!**

 **Please comment below what you think of it, they all really do make my day!**


	10. Episode 10

Lance liked to think of himself as a man of many words, ones that could charm woman into falling for him in an instant and ones that made people believe that he was a different species. He was able to speak many languages, some that humans have never even heard of before and one that was even considered dead. His ability to twist the truth to the point that people would get lost in the facts and the fakes made him the best liar in his family, able to lie to even his teammates, who dug around his mind on a semi-regular occurrence, without a single doubt in their mind that his words were indeed false.

So, he could say with confidence this Galran was officially the first person to make him speechless.

Lance wanted to blame it on his concussion, however, the quintessence had fully dissolved into his system now, giving him the impression that he was floating slightly despite being able to feel his body against the ground. All his aches and pains had seemingly disappeared, as if they were never there in the first place, despite knowing that his back was currently an open mess of blood and charred skin.

Would he be able to blame shock? He doubted it, but being blown up by a bomb and then waking up to a Galran commander breathing down his neck and then being injected by quintessence is some decent grounds for shock, right?

(Then there was that nagging thought in the back of his mind about how exactly the Galran commander knew about him being a druid and his cheeks being slightly itchy in a suspicious sort of way, but he shoved those thoughts to the back of his mind and locked them behind a steel door. Nope. Not ready for those thoughts just yet. Just. No.)

"Well, little druid? I'd rather not be kept waiting," Lance stared up at the Galran, and smiled at him innocently. Slowly, he got up from the position he had woken up in, and was mindful of his injuries, despite no longer being able to feel them. Even stood up, the Galran was able to easily tower over Lance, something that he was mindful of, but otherwise ignored, pretending to not even notice the height difference between the two of them.

"As much as I would love to give up my… 'teammate'," Lance started, the Galran language rolling off his tough in the same way that he knew English would, in a same way that he knew English did, "I'm afraid that I do not know enough information to 'sell them out', as you may have notice, I was caught up in your blast, and thus, I only know where the Black Paladin currently is," Lance stated, smiling brightly and tilting his head slightly, making it seem as if he was honoured to be injured. The Commander narrowed his eye, and nodded.

"I'm sure there is other information you can tell me," He stated, his eyes going to look at Shiro, who was now silent in shock, looking between Lance and the Commander.

This was going to be so hard to explain once this was all over, wasn't it?

"I'm sure there's many things I can tell you about the Paladins of Voltron," Lance replied civilly, the smile falling off his face but the tilt in his head still there. The commander blinked as he turned his head to look back down at Lance, before smiling, all teeth and no lip. Maybe Lance should feel scared, or threatened, or submissive at the very least, but he didn't. He was feeling very confident, very daring, very powerful. Maybe it was the quintessence in his system, which make the dust particles sparkle in front of his eyes and his head light, almost like he was drunk without the dizziness and the nausea and the giggles.

Maybe it was wrong of him to feel like this, maybe he shouldn't feel like he could take on the entire universe with his bare hands, but he could feel the Galra in front of him underestimate him, he could hear the thoughts that Lance was on his side, and how druids were easily swayed to do what he wanted, and that thought explained the… modifications to his eye and arm.

The thing was, despite the atrocities that the species had committed, they were a proud race. It did not sit well with them to lie about who they were, or what they can do, and they could never be wrong, or at least they could never admit they're wrong. Alteans are much the same, which explained why they got on so well, and why, when they did fall out, why they fell out as badly as they did.

But Lance grew up surrounded by humans, he grew up pretending to be human. He was used to admitting when he was wrong, apologising for when he wasn't correct.

He was brought up to be able to pass as a human, and thus, he was brought up to be a liar, and he was a good one at that.

So, breathing slowly, Lance began to bow, moving so his head looked towards the ground and his back was bent slightly. He could feel his back twitch and begin to bleed new blood as he did so, and he could only imagine how painful his head would be at this point if not for the quintessence running though his veins.

"If you do not know where the Paladins are, then what of the Lions?" Lance smirked, and as he looked up at the Galran's staring as if he was about to answer, he caught his eyeline, and that was enough to enter his mind, though the Galran was none the wiser to the intrusion.

"Offline, in the hangers," Lance muttered had he maintained eye contact. As soon as he let go off it, the Galran would know that someone had been in his head due to having a massive headache, so the aim of this was to implant ideas, thoughts. If he put too many into his mind, it will confuse him, but the point was to make sure the information planted was utterly useless. A song that got stuck in his head on Earth, the taste of chocolate, the smell of freshly cut grass.

At the same time, Lance also lightly searched though the top most thought, looking through what the galran commander was thinking. None of it seemed really important, nothing that Lance could use against him. A gladiator fight with Shiro as the main fighter, a meeting in Zarkon about finding the Red Lion. All old information really, nothing that was surprising to know about, nothing that they would have to act on when this was all over and done with.

"What about the-" He never got to finish his sentence when there was a power cut, all the power going out of the room, causing the crystal to be the only light source in the room, as well for the Galran, Sendek as Lance had just learned through going though his thoughts, to turn away from Lance, cutting off the eye contact as well as the connection, causing the pair of them to scream out in pain, Lance collapsing to the floor.

All the use of quintessence made his body begin to shake with exhaustion, he should really be unconscious at this point, he vaguely thought. Except, there was still a lot of corruption in his system, which kept him wide eyed despite the overwhelming desire to just close his eyes and sleep for 10'000 decapheobs like Allura and Coran did.

"That was rather sneaky of you, little druid," Lance let out a groan when he was picked up suddenly, because while he couldn't feel the pain in his back, and he could only imagine what sort of pain it was now, he was very tired from what he had done, and when Sendek's face came into view, confused, and disorientated, Lance could only smile in achievement of what he had done.

Shiro was shouting again, for some reason or other. Lance didn't know, and he wasn't sure he cared too much at this point. His head no longer felt light like it did earlier, no, it felt heavier than an elephant, and he wanted to go to sleep. He wanted to be put down, and Sendek did not help this in the slightest by squeezing him tightly, getting tighter and tighter, making him feel like he was going to pop.

He needed to get out of this, he needed to be dropped, let out, thrown across the room, anything to be taken out of the situation. Lance let out a sob as the pressure continued, knowing that he should be in a lot of pain right know, but not feeling it throwing off his mind. Sendek was talking now, but Lance didn't care, because he could only focus on the fact that _it needed to stop please make it stop please pleasestopitpleasestop-_

The sudden lack of pressure, the sudden sensation of falling, the sudden emptiness of now a lack of corrupted quintessence (and the thoughts of "where did it go" to "good riddance) meant that he was able to finally close his eyes, and he was able to just not worry anymore, the floor feeling slightly soothing against his hot head as his back erupted with a wave of red hot agony that would make the devils of the pits look like amateurs.

He welcomed the void with open arms.

* * *

 _When the dead was done, Lance doesn't dare sit down, because while his legs were shaky with adrenaline and his head was light and dizzy form what he had done, there was the fact that there was collapsed human on the floor._

 _His mind was racing, with the daunting realisation that he done it, he really had done it, and he done it successfully, with the nagging thought that he was in so much trouble when Mama got home, with memories that weren't his, desires that he had stolen and thoughts that were almost poisonous to ponder one._

" _Lance… What did you just do?" Lance looked up at Catharyne, the red slap mark on her face defining her murky green markings more somehow, tear marks trailing over them._

" _She found out," Lance said, as if that explained everything, and it's at this point when his head started pulsing, almost like it was too full, which was a strange thing for Lance to comprehend for a second._

 _Because he was fourteen, still so young, but now not quite as innocent as his family want him to be._

" _What the quiznek?" the pair of siblings quickly turned and saw Paulyne, holding poor 7-year-old Skye's hand._

" _I accidentally walked in without my human form on," Lance whispered, noting his sister going into shock and the look of horror growing on Paulyne's face. "We tried to explain it to her, to calm her, but she didn't take it well." Lance looked back down at the unconscious body on the floor. "I couldn't let her leave with the memories, not with the state that she was in."_

 _The rest of the night is a blur, Catharyne and Skye stay home while Lance and Paulyne take the girl to her home, and when she woke up again, Lance quickly slipped back into the chaos of her mind, telling her things that she wanted to know and taking the things that she wasn't allowed, finishing the job he had started, all under the resentful view of his older sister._

 _When they got home, Mama yelled. She never yelled. It was never in her nature to. Paulyne screamed about his actions and raved about how she would never be able to trust him or her own mind anymore, going on and on about how he could slip in whenever he wanted and there was thing that they could do about it. Lance cried silently at that, but he stood his ground. He said what he told Paulyne when she walked in. He said that it was his fault that she found out. That he was the blame. That he was sorry for risking the family, for being the reason why Catharyne's relationship ended, for practicing this art without someone knowing, for wiping someone's mind._

 _He stood by what he said. He lied to them all, and they did not suspect a thing. Catharyne cried to him later, said that she was sorry for what she did, said that she was sorry for putting him though that. Lance said it was alright, said that he would do more for her, do anything for her._

 _Lance knew from this day on that he was the bets liar in the family, and that is something that he always kept in mind, from when he went to school and applied to the Garrison, to when he saw two Alteans fall from a cryo-pod and four humans were given access to his deepest, darkest memories and thoughts._

 _Alteans were not natural liars. It never sat well with them to talk falsely of anything unless it was known that it was a made-up story, meant for younger kids and nothing more._

 _Lance was raised like that. He was raised on legends of heroes of old instead of magical fairies, raised to speak the truth and the notion of a lie was something that they never had to have go through their thoughts even once. But, at the same time, he had grown up surrounded with humans, who expected him to be the same as they were. There was a reason why he got along with humans better than the rest of his family. He was Blue, he was adaptable, he was able to be what they wanted him to be._

 _Humans were notorious liars. It would make sense if he was one too._

* * *

Falling was a sensation that Lance was not expecting after everything he had gone through, and he knew he was lucky to be caught when he was, because now that his eyes had focused more on the surroundings, he realised how close to the floor his face suddenly was, and how close he had been to landing on it.

He shivered lightly, and lent into the warmth that the person who caught him, signing softly, and closing his eyes, surrendering to the comfort. This person was like a furnace, but if the tense muscles were anything to go by, they were clearly not expecting this sort of reaction.

Tough luck kiddo.

He was just falling asleep when the person seemed to have had enough, and called out, "Uh, guys, a little help here please."

"Ugh, Keith! You interrupted our time measuring race- Wait! Lance is awake!" Hunk's voice sent electricity down his spine, and he jumped from the furnace person's arms (praise the 'Verse was he actually cuddling with Keith! Of all people! Nope. Don't remember. Didn't happen.), landing onto the floor, and he smiled brightly when everyone came rushing over.

Hunk didn't give him a chance to prepare before crushing him with a hug, and Lance let out a small laugh at his reaction, though his back feeling tender still. The others did not react the same as Hunk, however. Pidge looked confused, her eyes letting him that her thoughts were going a thousand miles an hour with no rest pits. Coran was tense, a look that did not suit the older Altean. Allura was the same, but she also held excitement. She too was thinking fast, but she knew what she wanted to find out. She knew what she wanted. Keith was his normal, closed off self, arms tight around his torso and a frown on his face. It was almost like he was emotionless, but Lance knew that it was all just getting to bubble out, and maybe not in a way that he could control.

Shiro's eyes were dark, closed off. He refused to even look at Lance, and it was at this point that Lance remembered that Shiro saw it all, saw every step he took, every growl he made. He had no idea what was said of course, unless he was fluent in Galran or had been giving a translator during his capture, but he saw him bow and there was no way that Shiro had no experience with a druid in the first place, not with the arm that he had attached to his body.

"I guess I have a lot of explaining to do, don't I?"

* * *

 **A.N. And we are done! I somehow got this into one chapter and I am emotions! Guys, it's almost been a year since I've started this series, and every update, no matter how long it's been since the last, I've always gotten such positive comments from all of you which warms my heart so much. Thank you all for being there for me to get this far.**

 **The next story is called Green, but I'm not sure when it will be out. I've got some other things that I want to work on first some bangs that need working on as well as some projects that i still need to finish. I've also been getting into the habit of writing the entire story before uploading it, which will be better for the lot of us XD.**

 **See you guys soon, I guess!**


	11. UPDATE

**Hey guys, just to let you know, the sequal to this story is now up, called** **'Green'. Enjoy!**


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